








R AT I N 



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HIBERNIAN PROVIDENT SOCIETY, 



W. E. R O B T N S O N. 







ST. PATRICK AND THE IRISH. 



OE A TI ON 



rUONOUNt'ED UEFORE THE 



HIBERNIAN PROVIDENT SOCIETY, 



NEW HAVEN, 



MARCH 17, 1843. 



WILLIAM ERIGENA ROBINSON, A. B. 



PUBLISHED AT THE REUUEST OF THE SOCIETY. 



PRINTED BY HITCHCOCK & STAFFORD. 
For sale by S. Babcock, New Haven; Belknap & Hamersley, Hartford; Casserly & Sons, 108 
Nassau street, New York; Babcock^ Co., Charleston, S. C. ; at Barlow's Bookstore, Schenec- 
tady ; Gough's Exchange, Albany ; at the Bookstores in Utica ; and the Pilot Office, Boston. 

MDCCCXLII. 




'L. 






MEMBERS 

OF THE 

NEW HAVEN HIBERNIAN PROVIDENT SOCIETY. 



BERNARD REILLY, President. 
PATRICK MURPHY, Vice President. 
JOHN GREEN, Secretary. 
MICHAEL COGAN, Treasurer. 



Timothy Barney, 
William Boyd, 
John Boylan, 
Nicholas Brady, 
Francis Brasil, 
Kearn9 Brasil, 
Richard Burke, 
Thomas Burke, 
Richard Burns, 
John Caffrey, 
John Cahill, 
James Callahan, 
Peter Carberry, 
Alexander Coldwell, 
Thomas Coldwell, 
William Coldwell, 
John Collins, 
Bernard Conlan, 
Michael Conlan, 
Joseph Conroy, 
Bernard Cosgrove, 
William Cosgrove, 
Daniel Costello, 
Patrick Costello, 
John Coyle, 
Daniel Crowley, 
Patrick Crowley, 
Michael Daly, 
Jeremiah Daniel, 
Thomas Danger, 
Michael Downes, 



Edward M. Downy, 
Patrick Duncan, 
Edward Dunn, 
Patrick Dwyer, 
Kearns Egan, 
Peter Egan, 
Charles Fagan, 
James Finnegan, 
James Finnegan, Jr. 
Michael Flaherty, 
John Flood, 
Matthew Flood, 
Thomas Flood, 
Bartholomew Gaffney, 
James Gaffney, 
Lawrence Gaffney, 
John Galligan, 
Dennis Gleeson, Jr. 
John Gleeson, 
James Gorman, 
James Hall, 
John Harvey, 
Michael Harvey, 
James Hayes, 
John Higgins, 
John Honan, 
Patrick Joyce, 
John Leahy, 
Michael Lynch, 
James M'Aveeney, 
Francis M'Bryan, 



James M'Cormack, 
James M'Grath, 
John M'Grath, 
Patrick M'Nally, 
Thomas Maher, 
Michael Martin, 
John Mockley, 
James Mooney, 
Hugh Mullan, 
Michael Mullan, 
Patrick Murphy, 2d, 
John Penders, 
Daniel Quinlan, 
John Reilly, 
Patrick Reilly, 
John Ryan, 
John Ryan, Jr. 
John G. Ryan, 
John Sheridan, 
Patrick Sheridan, 
Michael Stokes, 
Owen Sullivan, 
Dennis Tivenin, 
Peter Turbert, 
Patrick Voucher, 
Patrick Wall, 
Thomas Wallace, 
Owen Ward, 
Hugh Woods, 
James Woods, 
Patrick Woods. 



5)5" W. E. Robinson and several others are honorary members of the Society. The names of 
the active members only, are inserted in this list. 



REMARKS. 



The Society before which the following Oration was delivered, 
was organized, by a few Irishmen resident in New Haven, on the 
25th of January, 1841. On the 3d of February following, a Con- 
stitution and By-Laws were read and adopted; and on the 17th of 
the same month, officers of the Society were chosen. At the funeral 
solemnities in memory of our lamented President Harrison, the 
Society made its first public appearance, April 17th, 1841, and 
attracted much attention, as it was the first Hibernian Society ever 
seen in New Haven. The newspapers of our city praised its ap- 
pearance, and James G. Percival, Esq., wrote the following lines, 
accompanied by some complimentary remarks, which were published 
in the New Haven Daily Herald, of April 20th, with the exception 
of the last stanza, which he afterwards furnished to Mr. Robinson. 
They are here copied complete, and show the cordiality with which 
the poet speaks the language of the Irish emigrant. 

O ! Erin, green gem, that lies all in the sea, 

So rich in paratys, and warm Irish hearts ; 
When I think that a jewel, so rare, isn't free, 

The tear of regret from my full bosom starts. 

O ! there is the home of my childhood, the spot 
"Where I first dug the turf by the side of the moor: 

Though humble and rude was my father's low cot, 
To the stranger stood open his heart and his door. 

And that home of my childhood shall ne'er be forgot ; 

Of its green sod I'll think, while my green badge I wear: 
O ! I wish they'd as free and as happy a lot, 

The friends I left under the Sassenagh there. 

God's blessing be on thee, my own native isle ; 

Ever fresh be thy Shamrock, and stout thy Shillelagh : 
May the green flag of Union soon over thee smile, 

And every true Irish heart under it rally. 



And sure every son of his father '11 be 

A patriot pure, in so glorious a cause ; 
And sure, then, sweet Ireland, the land of the free, 

Shall ring with Te-Deums and Erin-go-braghs. 

At a General Assembly of the State of Connecticut, holden at 
Hartford, in May, 1841, Roger S. Baldwin, Esq., of New Haven, 
presented a petition for an act of incorporation, which was granted 
at the same session. At a regular meeting of the Society, December 
7th, it was resolved to have a public celebration on the following 
Patrick's day, and the officers of the Society were appointed a com- 
mittee to invite W. E. Robinson, Esq., of New Haven, to deliver 
an Oration on that occasion ; to which he consented. It was also 
resolved to have a new banner painted, and new badges provided for 
the members. Mr. Robinson was requested to furnish designs for 
the banner, which he did at a subsequent meeting, and they were 
approved. The Society gave their first annual ball on Monday, 
January 3d, 1842, the proceeds of which were given to pay the 
expenses of the banner. At the celebration on Patrick's day, every 
thing went off well, and every one was highly pleased. A very large 
and respectable audience assembled in the Saloon, to hear the 
address of Mr, Robinson, great numbers being unable to gain ad- 
mittance. The following account of the proceedings is copied from 
the New Haven Daily Herald, edited by Thomas G. Woodward, Esq. 

Yesterday, the 17th, the day of the canonization of the patron 
saint of old Ireland, was celebrated for the first time in this city, by 
the New Haven Hibernian Provident Society. Ample preparations 
had been made for the occasion, by providing appropriate badges 
and other insignia, including a beautiful banner, painted by Mr. 
Mitchell, of this city, which does honor both to the artist and 
the gentleman who designed it. On one side it represents St. Pat- 
rick, in his sacerdotal robes, with his Bishop's mitre and Apostolic 
crosier, preaching before King Leogaire, his Queen, and the Druids, 
at Tara's Hall. He holds in his right hand the three leaved Sham- 
rock, from which he deduces the doctrine of the Trinity — three in 
one — in opposition to the dogmas of the Druids — the faithful wolf 
dog of Ireland crouching at the king's feet — the darkness of Paganism 
and the serpents of the Isle flying before the face of the Apostle. 



On the reverse is a portrait of Gen. Montgomery, representing the 
adopted citizen, attended by the Genius of Ireland resting on a Harp, 
clothed in white and green, delivering to Washington, who represents 
the native citizen, a scroll inscribed with the word Quebec, — in the 
distance, the temple and the goddess of liberty. Over all the national 
eagle spreads his wings, bearing in his beak a scroll, with the mottos, 
U E Pluribus Unum" and " Erin go bragh." 

We believe every portion of our fellow citizens was gratified with 
the display of the Hibernian Society, comprising the great body of 
our Irish population, and showing the rank and character which they 
are assuming in society. No congregated body of our citizens has 
ever appeared in a more orderly manner, nor in a more respectable 
character, than the associated Irishmen of this city. We give a 
detailed account of their proceedings, which would have been more 
full, if time had permitted. 

The Society assembled at 8 o'clock A. M., in the Society's Hall, 
in Street's Building, and about 9, led by the band of the New Haven 
Blues, proceeded through Chapel and York streets, to the Catholic 
Church, on Mount Pleasant, where religious exercises were per- 
formed, and a sermon preached by the Rev. Mr. Smyth, the Pastor 
of the Church. Mr. S. gave a graphic sketch of the early history of 
Ireland ; its various colonies, its ancient glory, customs, and manners, 
down to the time of St. Patrick's mission, whose services and 
character he illustrated with much enthusiasm. After contrasting 
the renown and prosperity of the country under her own kings and 
laws, with the misery and degradation which British misgovernment 
has brought upon her, he concluded by an exhortation to the con- 
gregation to observe the day in a becoming manner, assuring them 
that the vengeance of heaven would overtake those who should 
desecrate such a day by any species of profaneness or immorality. 

During the services the choir of the Church, assisted by Mr. 
Cooke on the organ, performed Hail Glorious Apostle, and several 
other pieces of music, in excellent style. 

After divine service in the Church, the Society proceeded through 
Broad, George, and State streets, to their room, where they dis- 
persed for dinner. 

At half past 2 P. M., they again formed, and marched through 



State, Elm, York, and Chapel streets, to the Exchange Saloon, 
where the following exercises took place. 

1. Song, by Mr. Phcebus — written by J. G. Percival, Esq., of 
New Haven, for the occasion. 

Am — " Patrick's Day." 

Hail ! to the morning, when first he ascended, 
The Jewel of Erin, the Saint, and the Sage — 
O ! long may the rays of his glory be blended, 
In harmony clear, on the poet's page. 

Long may the sainted Patrick bless us, 

Long as the flow'rs of Erin smile. 
True-hearted Irishmen ever shall follow him — 
Ever pure pray'rs from warm bosoms shall hallow him — 
Praises resound through each consecrate pile : 
And O ! may his spirit awake to redress us, 
And rescue from tyrants our sacred isle. 

Hark ! to the voice, that through Connaught resounded, 
Aloft from her mountain so high and so green. — 
It spake — through that gem, by the bright ocean bounded, 
No venomous creature again was seen. 

Roses and shamrocks filled each valley — 

Green waved the oak above each hill : 
Health, in each eye, sparkled clear as the fountain ; 
Pure was each kiss, as the dew of the mountain ; 
Swelled every bosom with joy, to its fill — 
But O ! he forgot, with his trusty shillelagh, 
To crush that foul Hydra, the worm of the still. 

Hark ! to the voice, that, through Erin resounding, 
Awakens the spirits of freemen again. — 
It calls, and the hearts of old Ireland are bounding — 
As they beat, snap the steel links of slavery's chain ! 

Millions there wake to pride and glory — 

Think of their sires, the strong and free ! 
Millions too, warm with a patriot's devotion, 
Send their fond wishes across the wide ocean, 
Erin ! O beautiful Erin ! to thee ; 
For O ! thou art rescued, and ever in story, 
Thy Patrick and Matthew united shall be. 

2. Oration, by Wm. E. Robinson, Esq., a son of the Emerald 
Isle, which chained and charmed the attention of a large and 
respectable audience for nearly two hours. The address of Mr. R. 
(who is a graduate of Yale College) was such as to do honor to the 
occasion, and to the intelligence which a Yankee education has 



added to the genius of an Irishman, smarting under the ills of na- 
tional degradation, fired with the eloquence of Curran and Grattan, 
and inspired with the patriotism of all the heroic sons of his native 
land. With a little deduction in comparing the merits of native 
and adopted citizens, his address was not only unexceptionable in its 
general characteristics, but was an honorable effort of an intuitive and 
intelligent mind to do justice to the Irish character, with a natural 
devotion to the best interests of his countrymen and the country of 
their adoption. We think it is worthy of publication, and hope that 
the public will be favored with it in a shape which will render it 
accessible to all, and at least give greater scope to much legendary 
lore, if it should not render any contribution to general and familiar 
history. It was all that either could be desired or expected on such 
an occasion, and gave the utmost satisfaction to all who heard it. 

3. Song, by Dr. J. J. Stone — written for the occasion by Wm. E. 
Robinson, Esq., of New Haven. 

Air — " Savoamah Deelish." 

Dear Isle of the ocean, farewell to thy mountains ! 

Farewell to the graves where my forefathers sleep ! 
Farewell to thy green hills, thy pure sparkling fountains ! 

Farewell, though at parting the exile must weep ! 
Soon may the light of thy noon-day be blended 
In glory, with rays of thy morning so splendid ; 
Soon may thy winter of anguish be ended, 

Erin Mavourneen — Erin go Bragh. 

Columbia, hail ! see a heart broken stranger, 
Rejoicing in hope, sets his foot on thy shore ; 

Thy free Institutions shall guard him from danger — 
The chains of oppression shall bind him no more. 

For thee, his heart swells with a patriot's devotion ; 

For thee, are his prayers offered up on the ocean ; 

Yet tearful and sad is the silent emotion, 

Which still bears his heart back to Erin go Bragh. 

Great land! where the ashes of Barry now slumber ; 

Where Irish Montgomery hallows the ground ; 
Where Erin's Mac Nevin and Emmet we number, 

With those whom American laurels have crowned. 
Great land of their graves ! while I live I shall bless thee ; 
Dear land of their birth, may no tyrants oppress thee : 
Dear land of my fathers, I grieve to address thee, 

With Erin Mavourneen, Slan-lat go Bragh.* 

* Ireland, my darling, farewell forever. 



4. The exercises were concluded with a song by Mr. Phcebus, 
written for the occasion by Rev. John Pierpont, of Boston. 

Air — " A fine old English Gentleman." 

Saint Patrick was a clever saint, that drove the snakes and frogs, 
And all the other varmints out of Erin's lakes and bogs ; 
And so, upon this blessed day that tells us of his birth, 
Do Erin's children celebrate, with songs and festive mirth, 
That fine old Irish patron saint, that lived in olden time. 

The poets tell of Harkyles, — but don't believe their blarney — 
Who killed the hundred headed hydra, in the lake of Larney, 
Tho' it is evident the Greek could never have done that trick ; 
The lake was, sure, if^-larney's lake, and Harkyles St. Patrick, 
That fine old Irish patron saint, that lived in olden time. 

But Erin has a greater saint than he that, from her lakes, 
Drove all the croaking frogs away, and from her land the snakes ; 
It is the Temp'rance Harkyles that God has sent to kill 
The leaden sarpint that lies coiled and hissing by the still ; 
A finer saint than e'er was born, e'en in the olden time. 

Far better that St. Patrick's snakes through Erin's vales should glide, 
With all the frogs he crushed to death, and all the toads beside, 
Than let the streams of usquebaugh among her children flow : — 
Then here's to Father Matthew, in a cup as pure as snow ; — 
A finer saint than e'er was born, e'en in the olden time. 

At the close of the proceedings, three several hearty cheers were 
given for the Orator of the day, Mr. Percival, and Rev. Mr. Pier- 
pont, the gentlemen who sung the songs, the Music, and the Press. 

The Society then proceeded through Church, Elm, Temple, and 
Chapel streets, to their room, stopping on their way opposite Mr. 
Percival's residence, where the band played St. Patrick's Day, the 
air to which his beautiful lines were composed. 

At their room, votes of thanks were passed to J. G. Percival, Esq. 
Rev. John Pierpont, and W. E. Robinson, Esq., for the songs so 
kindly furnished for the occasion ; to Dr. Stone and Mr. Phcebus, 
for their very acceptable services ; to the marshals of the day — 
Messrs. W. Coldwell and C. Fagan — for the manner in which they 
had discharged their duties, and to the band of the New Haven Blues. 
A vote of thanks was carried by three cheers for the Orator ; several 
appropriate sentiments were offered, and after hearing Yankee Doodle 
by the band, the Society adjourned at 6 o'clock P. M. 



ORATION 



Ladies and Gentlemen : 

We have met together, this day, to commemorate the ser- 
vices of one of the most distinguished benefactors of mankind. 
More than fourteen centuries have passed, since the great 
apostle of Ireland raised the cross of Christ in that island, on 
the ruins of paganism. One thousand three hundred and sev- 
enty-seven years ago, this day, the sainted Patrick, having 
rested from his labors on earth, was carried, with songs of 
praise, to the mansions of eternal rest. Yet the waves of 
time have not quenched our love for one who has done so 
much for our country. The memory of the just is still held 
in reverence among us ; and our hearts still beat high with 
feelings of veneration for him who, leaving the land of his birth 
for a strange and pagan country, devoted a life of self- 
denial and piety to the moral regeneration of Ireland. 
Here, in a land then unknown — under free institutions, which 
Irish hands have assisted in building up — blessed with liberty 
bought by the blood of Irishmen — in the land of Washing- 
ton and Montgomery, we meet this day, to bless the benefac- 
tor of our native land. 

The early history of Ireland is as bright as her modern his- 
tory is dark and cloudy. Before England was known among 
the nations of the earth, the Irish were a refined and polished 
people. One thousand years before the birth of Christ, Ire- 
land was peopled, and connected with Phoenicia through com- 
merce. Homer doubtless had reference to the places in 
commercial intercourse with Phoenicia, when he described his 
Elysian fields. A work written by Aristotle, or at least by a 
2 



10 

contemporary of that great philosopher, refers to Ireland ; 
and the " Argonautica," supposed to have been written from 
six to ten centuries before Christ, describes " Ierne." Every 
writer, who gave his attention to the history and geography 
of the world, from that time to Tacitus, who lived in the first 
century of the Christian era, has referred to Ireland. Taci- 
tus, in the twenty-fourth chapter of his Agricola, tells us, that 
"the waters and harbors of Ireland were better known, 
through the resort of commerce and navigators, than those 
of Britain." Ptolemy, Plutarch, Diodorus Siculus, Strabo, 
and Pliny the elder, have all referred to Ireland, with much 
more precision than to any of the other nations of western 
Europe. From time immemorial, Ireland was called the " sa- 
cred isle," owing to the performance of religious exercises by 
the merchants of Tyre and others, who traded with the west, 
for the tin of Cassiterides, as early as the times of David and 
Solomon. 

I do not say that all the legend and poetry of ancient Irish 
history should command belief. It has been the misfortune of 
the country to be wronged, both by historians and by rulers. 
Those who wished to destroy the nationality of Ireland, 
(among whom Giraldus Cambrensis has obtained an unenvia- 
ble notoriety,) burned the most valuable records of her ancient 
glory, and exposed to ridicule the tradition and other remain- 
ing memorials of her fame. For this purpose, books have 
been written on the " Wonders of Ireland," in which her 
genuine legend and tradition have been so metamorphosed and 
exaggerated, as to shake all belief in her ancient history. 
Others, who have attempted, with honest hearts, to write truth, 
have been deceived, by these crafty defamers, into a belief of 
the most incredible absurdities, which they have transmitted 
as the true history of Ireland, and thereby have shaken the 
belief of the world in every argument urged in favor of her 
great antiquity. Most of her historians, too, have been igno- 
rant of the Irish language ; and those who professed to be 
best acquainted with it, have made very ridiculous blunders, 



n 

in tracing the names of men and places back to the roots from 
which they are derived. 

But, notwithstanding all these disadvantages, Ireland may 
well be proud of the history of her olden time. No people can 
boast of clearer evidence of great antiquity and renown. 
Though no nation can give any thing more than poetic legend 
and uncertain dates, for very early history, yet Ireland can 
furnish strong evidence that letters were known to her people, 
probably as early as the writing of the Pentateuch of Moses. 
That her alphabet was not derived either from the Greeks or 
Romans, is evident from the fact, that it corresponds in num- 
ber with neither, but with the original alphabet of Cadmus, 
which was introduced from Phoenicia to Greece, about fifteen 
centuries before the commencement of the Christian era. 
The Irish language is the best preserved dialect of the ancient 
Celtic, which all acknowledge to have been the earliest brought 
from the East by the immediate descendants of Noah. The 
belief, therefore, that the Irish language was used by Adam, 
in his conversation with Eve, in Eden, is not so ridiculous 
nor so improbable as some, without, reflection, might sup- 
pose. The sixteen letters of the Cadmean alphabet are now 
found in no other language save the Irish, and that has not, 
like others, changed as time rolled by, but still remains the 
same, though used by the people of Ireland for probably more 
than three thousand years. England claims the honor of 
having assembled the first Parliament in the British isles, ten 
or twelve centuries after Christ ; but the most sceptical of 
Irish historians acknowledge that Ollamh Fodhla, who, accord- 
ing to some historians, was contemporaneous with Lycurgus, 
the lawgiver of Sparta, established a triennial Parliament at 
the royal palace of Tara, where the three orders, Monarch, 
Druids, and Plebeians, assembled to make laws for the nation. 
At the meetings of this great convention, the records of the 
country were examined, and arranged in the national register, 
called the Psalter of Tara. Music, poetry, and medicine, 
were taught in schools and colleges, which this great and 



12 

learned monarch patronized. Heraldry, too, was studied by 
his directions, and at the festivals given in the great hall of 
Tara, during the sitting of the convention, the members took 
their seats under their appropriate coats of arms, which were 
arranged around the hall. I might likewise refer to the learn- 
ing of Cormac Ulfadha, the military renown of Finn M'Cum- 
hal, (Fingal,) the integrity of Moran, the chief judge of the 
nation. I might dwell upon the renown of Ossian, the Irish 
poet, and trace the history of her military monarchs, Conn of 
a Hundred Battles, Nial of the Nine Hostages, and other kings 
who fought against the Roman power, both by land and sea, 
and who followed the legions of the imperial city through 
Britain and Gaul, even to the foot of the Alps, where Dathy, 
the last pagan monarch of Ireland, was killed by lightning ; 
but I have said enough to show the absurdity of those histo- 
rians who commence the history of Ireland with the invasion 
of Henry II., when it really terminated, and of those who 
date the first dawn of learning among the Irish, from the mis- 
sion of St. Patrick. 

The Roman power, which was a scourge to the other na- 
tions of Europe, was destined to be a blessing to Ireland. 
Though it had conquered England, and Gaul, and Germany, 
it found in Irish valor a serious obstacle to its design of uni- 
versal dominion over Europe. To understand the position 
which the Irish occupied about the commencement of the 
Christian era, it is necessary to remember that they exclu- 
sively were the Scots, whose alliance with the Picts of Cale- 
donia, forced the Romans to build great walls across the island 
to prevent their destructive inroads. What we now call Scot- 
land, obtained its Scottish name and Scottish people from Ire- 
land, about the middle of the third century, when Carbry Ri- 
adha, grandson of the Irish monarch, Conn, established an 
Irish colony in Argyleshire, which became the kingdom of 
Scotland, after the conquest of the Picts by Keneth Mac Al- 
pine, from whom James the Sixth of Scotland, when ascend- 
ing the English throne, claimed that he was a lineal descend- 



13 

ant. Sir Walter Scott, who would never surrender to another 
country what belonged to his native Caledonia, in his history 
of Scotland, acknowledges that historians " must trace the 
original roots of the royal line" in these Irish chiefs of Argyle- 
shire. Sir James Mcintosh, Edmund Burke, Plowden, Le- 
land, and a host of Scotch, Irish, and English historians, have 
acknowledged that in early European history, Ireland exclu- 
sively was known as Scotland, and the Irish as Scots. 

These Scots harassed the Romans, not only in Britain, but 
in Gaul and Germany ; and Dathy, as we have seen, in his 
daring design of crossing the Alps, as Hannibal had done a 
few centuries before, was killed by lightning from heaven. 
The poet Claudian, referring to these Irish warriors says, that 
" the Scot moved all Ireland, and the ocean foamed with his 
hostile oars." Thus wafted across the seas in their curraghs, 
or wicker boats, the Irish, under their monarch, Nial of the 
Nine Hostages, besieged the city of Tours, then a Roman 
fortress, and captured it. Nial returned to Ireland with two 
hundred prisoners, who, according to the custom of the coun- 
try, were sold into slavery. Among these were young Pat- 
rick, then about sixteen years of age, and his two sisters, Lu- 
pida and Dererca. 

As historians differ from each other, in relating the time and 
place of his birth, I shall follow Moore, whose valuable work, 
published originally in Lardner's Cabinet Cyclopaedia, is the 
best history of Ireland ever written. 

Patrick was born A. D. 387, in that part of France which 
is called Boulogne. His father, Calphurn, supposed by some 
to be of Roman descent, and by others, to be descended from 
Jewish captives, brought to Rome by Titus, after the de- 
struction of Jerusalem, A. D. 70, held a political office for 
some time, which he afterwards abandoned, and having 
entered into holy orders, became a deacon. His mother, 
Conchessa, was a native of France. His original name was 
Succath, but when the Pope conferred upon him the Patrician 
order, the title of Patricius supplanted the baptismal name. 



14 

On arriving a captive in Ireland, A. D. 403, Patrick was 
sold to one Milcho, living in that part of Ireland now known 
as Antrim, who appointed the youthful slave as his shep- 
herd. The mountain, now called Sliebh-Miss, or the Moun- 
tain of the Moon, was the place he chose for his medita- 
tion and prayer. After seven years' slavery, Patrick returned 
to the Continent, and studied at Tours for about four years. 
Having spent about twenty years more in study and medi- 
tation on lonely islands, and in secluded retreats of piety, 
he visited Rome, with recommendations from St. German to 
the Pope. Ireland had still been before his youthful imagina- 
tion. From his own pen we learn that he had thought so 
much about her, that she was present with him whether sleep- 
ing or waking ; and in dreams he saw a messenger, bearing a 
scroll, on which were written these words, " The voice of the 
Irish." 

Though Palladius had been sent by Pope Celestine to Ire- 
land, and though several other Christians had visited, or were 
natives of the island ; though Pelagius, and his disciple Ce- 
lestius, who were both Irishmen, had disseminated their pecu- 
liar doctrines among some of the people ; yet Ireland had not 
renounced paganism. The old Irish proverb, " Not to Palla- 
dius, but to Patrick, did God grant the conversion of Ireland," 
shows that Christianity had scarce been known, when Patrick 
arrived in the country. The ancient Irish worshiped the sun, 
as Bel, whose rites they celebrated, not in temples made with 
hands, but in the grove of oaks, which the great Supreme Be- 
ing had raised for his own worship, and had covered in his 
own rich livery of green, and in whose honor two fires were 
kindled in every district on the first of May. The moon, too> 
under the name of Re, had her appropriate worship, and on 
her altar a fire was kindled on the first of November, from 
which the winter hearths of the people were lighted. Groves 
and wells, stones and pillars, were consecrated to idols, and in 
the plain of Magh Sleacth, or Field of Slaughter, human vic- 
tims were offered in sacrificing to their great Crom-Cruagh, 



V 

15 

who was surrounded by twelve lesser idols, representing, most 
probably, the twelve signs of the Zodiac. The round towers 
of Ireland, about which so much has been written, but con- 
cerning the use and origin of which no antiquarian has 
given any definite account, and which have existed, probably, 
since the days of Solomon, when Tyre, Egypt, and Ireland 
were united through Phoenician commerce, were, probably, 
used in the worship of the god Bel, for taking observations on 
heavenly bodies, and thus determining the equinoctial and sol- 
stitial times, by which to regulate the recurrence of religious 
festivals. Incense was offered in high places, on the hills and 
under the green trees. The Druids were accustomed to 
light up blazing fires, and after performing incantations over 
them, made the herds of cattle to pass through them. 

But these things, though interesting, must not be dwelt upon 
here. These dark superstitions, and the reign of idolatry, 
were doomed to pass away before the light of Christianity. 
The sun, which the Irish had been accustomed to worship, 
was soon to yield his honors and glory to a brighter luminary. 
In his own simple language, St. Patrick told them, that " the 
sun, which we behold, rises daily, at the command of God, 
for our use ; yet will he never reign, nor shall his splendor en- 
dure ; and all those who adore him will descend wretchedly 
into punishment. But we believe and adore the true Sun, 
Christ." The captive boy had grown to be a Bishop of the 
Church of Rome, and thus clothed with apostolic power, he 
returned to the land of his adoption, A. D. 432, bearing the 
words of life eternal to a brave and learned, yet still pagan 
people. 

Patrick first landed near Dublin, but meeting with much op- 
position there, he reembarked, and landed in Ulster, in the 
north of Ireland, near what is now called Strangford. After 
converting many of the northern people, and visiting his for- 
mer master, Milcho, (who obstinately refused to be converted, 
and, as some historians tell us, hearing that his son and two 
daughters had forsaken the religion of their fathers, set fire 



16 

to his house, and threw himself into the flames,) Patrick vis- 
ited the hall of Tara, where a great meeting of the princes 
and hierarchs of the nation was assembled. 

On the eve of the festival of Easter, Patrick pitched his 
tent for the night, in the neighborhood of Tara, where the 
monarch Leogaire and the assembled princes were celebrating 
the rites of their sun-worship, and there, at night-fall, kindled 
the paschal fire. As the law was that no fire should be kin- 
dled, except by flame obtained from the altar of Bel, which 
had not yet been lighted, the king was angry, and the Druids, 
speaking with prophetic truth, exclaimed, " This fire, which 
has now been kindled before our eyes, unless extinguished this 
very night, will never be extinguished throughout all time. 
Moreover, it will tower above all the fires of our ancient rites, 
and he who lights it will ere long scatter your kingdom." In- 
dignant as the king was, he nevertheless consented to hear 
Patrick preach the following day, and dispute with the most 
learned of the Druids. So convincing were the arguments of 
the apostle, that the arch-poet, Dubtach, was converted, and 
the monarch exclaimed, "it is better that I should believe than 
die." The queen, if not also the monarch, was converted, to- 
gether with their two daughters. It was on this occasion, 
that Patrick, when told by the Druids that the doctrine of the 
Trinity was absurd, as three could not exist in one, stooped 
down, and pulling a shamrock, which has three leaves on one 
stem, replied, " To prove the reality and possibility of the ex- 
istence of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, I have only to 
pluck up this humble plant, on which we have trodden, and 
convince you that truth can be attested by the simplest symbol 
of illustration." This is the scene with which the artist has 
ornamented one side of your beautiful banner. 

Aongus, king of Munster, sent to Tara for Patrick. He 
accompanied the messengers to Cashel, and there converted 
the king, who immediately requested the saint to administer 
the sacrament of baptism. Patrick, delighted to hear the 



17 

request, fastened the sharp point of his crosier in the floor, 
and inadvertently pierced the royal foot. The king, supposing 
that this was part of the ceremony, bore the pain with be- 
coming fortitude. The Irish painter, Barry, the friend of 
Burke, has given one of his master efforts on this subject. 

The apostle made a journey into Connaught, passing through 
the county Leitrim, where the Plain of Slaughter was situated, 
and where the bloody idol Crom-Cruagh, to which, as of old 
to Moloch, children were offered in sacrifice, was worshiped. 
This idol, with his worship, Patrick destroyed, and raised in 
its stead a Christian church. During the season of Lent, he 
retired to the lofty mountain, now known as Croagh-Patrick, 
which overlooks Clew bay, in the county Mayo. According 
to traditionary story, it was from this hill that St. Patrick, 
having collected all the venomous creatures together, drove 
them into the sea — to which Percival, in the lines which he 
has written for this celebration, refers : 

" Hark ! to the voice, that through Connaught resounded, 
Aloft from her mountain so high and so green. — 
It spake — through that gem, by the bright ocean bounded, 
No venomous creature again was seen." 

Here, on the heights of an untrodden mountain, the prayers of 
the pious Patrick rose to heaven for his much-loved Ireland. 
And no wonder that the people, as they saw sea-fowls and 
birds of prey attracted thither by the strange sight of a hu- 
man being in so unfrequented a region, readily believed that 
evil spirits came obedient to his will, and that every relic of 
poisoned superstition was banished by him, who could com- 
mand even flocks of winged demons to obey. 

At great assemblies of the people — at meetings convened 
for settling the succession to any of the thrones of Ireland — 
Patrick was ever present. At one of these assemblies, it is 
said that the seven princes-royal who were disputing about 
the succession to the throne of their deceased father, were 
3 



18 

converted, together with twelve thousand people, who were 
soon afterwards baptized by him. 

After visiting almost every part of Connaught, he made 
another journey to Ulster, founded in Derry and Tyrone the 
cathedrals of Derry and Clogher, passed the river Bann, at 
Coleraine, where he erected a church and an abbe}^ and then 
returned to Armagh, where, pleased with the beauty of the 
spot, he resolved to build a great cathedral, splendid above 
all the other churches in the island. The Metropolitan 
Cathedral of Ireland was here built by Patrick, about the year 
445. Since that time, Armagh has been the ecclesiastical 
Capital of the island, and here, at present, is the seat of the 
Lord Primate. 

Among the monasteries, which he founded in Meath, Dublin, 
Kildare, Carlow, Armagh, Louth, Longford, Antrim, Derry, 
Tyrone, Roscommon, Sligo, Fermanagh, and almost every 
other county in Ireland, was one at Lough-Derg, in the 
county Donegal, to which he frequently retired in after life, to 
devote himself entirely to fasting, meditation, and prayer. 
On this very island, at the present time, the people are accus- 
tomed to assemble for prayer, fasting, and penance, as their 
great apostle set them the example fourteen centuries ago. 

From Armagh, Patrick went to Dublin, where he had be- 
fore been unsuccessful. On the evening of his arrival, a son 
of Alphin, the chief of the city, was drowned in the river 
Liffey. The lady of Alphin, though a pagan, ran to the 
Christian apostle, and, on her knees, implored him to come 
and pray over her child. Moved by her sufferings, he went 
with her and knelt by the body of the child, which had just 
been taken from the water ; and having touched it with his 
crosier, which was called the staff of Jesus, it recovered, 
and was given to the arms of its weeping mother. Alphin, 
his family, and his people were converted, and a portion of 
land was presented to the saint, as a token of gratitude, on 
which a church was built, and which is now the site of St. 
Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin. 



19 

Though very successful in his apostolic mission, Patrick's 
life was not all a smooth current, even in his labors of love 
for Ireland. On one occasion, while passing through what is 
now called King's county, his charioteer, Odran, who had 
learnt the intention of a desperate chieftain to attack the 
saint, and finding no other way to save him, under the pre- 
tence of being sick or fatigued prevailed upon Patrick to ex- 
change seats, and so the servant received the lance which was 
intended for his master. This, to the credit of Ireland be it 
told, is the only martyr in the history of the introduction of 
Christianity to the island. In his confession, Patrick acknowl- 
edges that he used to make presents to the unconverted kings, 
and to use other means for preventing a general persecution. 
This was his plan for recommending the charitable doctrines 
of the gospel, and it would be well if some modern apostles 
would imitate his example, rather than proscribe, persecute, 
and slander, as is too often the case. On another occasion, a 
design was planned for taking away his life, by a band of 
robbers. The chief bandit he not only baffled in his designs 
upon his life, but actually brought him to profess the Christian 
religion. Patrick imposed upon him as a penance, that he 
should take one of the frail curraghs or leathern boats, and 
with no clothing, save a coarse garment, should trust himself 
to the waves and winds for his safety. The penitent obeyed, 
and was carried to the Isle of Man, where he was afterwards 
bishop of the island. 

A British prince, named Coroticus, who professed to be a 
Christian, invaded Ireland, and plundered the people of a dis- 
trict, in Munster, where Patrick had been baptizing the day 
previous. Some were murdered, and some taken prisoners 
and sold to the Pictish chiefs, who were then warring against 
England. Patrick, in a letter to this pirate, which, besides his 
confession, is the only piece of his writing now extant, de- 
nounced him as a robber and a murderer, and, as bishop of 
Ireland, declares him to be excommunicated. 

During the remainder of his life, the good Patrick visited 



20 

the several churches, and encouraged learning among the 
people. It is said that he wrote with his own hand, three hun- 
dred copies of the alphabet. After a long life of piety, use- 
fulness, and fame, the saint of Ireland sank to rest, at the age 
of seventy-eight, or, as some say, at the age of one hundred 
and twenty, revered by all who knew him. Where dark- 
ness had been till the star of his advent appeared, his light 
went out peacefully, and blended with the glory of the gospel 
sun. No pomp heralded his coming ; no mailed armies 
guarded his dying bed ; but the hosts of heaven were sent on 
their wings of light, to bear the saint to his place of rest ; and 
as they bore him with songs of praise over the fleecy drapery 
of heaven, the sounds of angelic praises sung to his name, 
have been caught from heaven, and reechoed from earth, and 
still live fresh and undying among a warm-hearted and grate- 
ful people. In Downpatrick, near the place where he tended 
his sheep in slavery, his ashes now repose. 

" In Down, three saints one grave do fill, 
Patrick, Bridget, and Columb Kille." 

Here his sainted bones rested, and here were his shrine and 
the offerings of piety which adorned it, till the Protestant re- 
ligion was introduced by Henry VIIL, when the venerable 
relics, including the crosier or staff of Jesus, by which, it is 
said, he performed his miracles, were destroyed. It is re- 
volting to look upon the means with which the political and 
religious subjugation of Ireland has been attempted. The 
annals of her fame and glory were burned by the Vandals of 
Henry II. ; and the venerated memorials of her religion were 
destroyed by the Goths of Henry VIIL But the same bar- 
barous policy caused the destruction of the records of Welsh 
and Scottish literature, as well as of Irish learning, that tyrants 
might subjugate a people by removing from their minds the 
memory of their former greatness. 

Some have pretended to doubt whether ever St. Patrick 
had an existence, unless in the brain of some Irish enthusiast ; 



21 



for which the grave reason is assigned, that the time and place 
of his hirth are disputed. Let us then apply the rule to another 
great man in history, Homer. What was the year, or where 
was the place in which Homer was born 1 But it is said that 
the miraculous stories told of Patrick are a proof against his ex- 
istence ; — that he swam to Scotland on a millstone, came back 
in two ships, and fasted thirty-six hours out of every twenty- 
four, appear to be incredible stories, but do they prove his non- 
existence ? The stories which we read concerning Hercules, 
Achilles, and Ulysses, we do not believe ; but they strengthen 
our belief that such men really had an existence. If the ex- 
ploits of Greek and Roman demi-gods are said to be the day- 
dreams of classic poetry, why not give Patrick the benefit of 
the same rule, for Irishmen have been poetically inclined too ? 
The date and place of his birth are not so uncertain as we 
might expect, after the care that has been taken to cast doubt 
and difficulty around the subject. Though some have claimed 
that he was a native Irishman, and others assert that he was a 
Welshman, though some contend that he was a Lowland Scot, 
and others that he was a Highland Scot, it is still pretty gen- 
erally acknowledged that he was a native of Gaul, as I have 
already stated. Scotland has attempted to take every thing 
Irish to herself. Old Irish Oisin and Fin M'Cumhal she has 
carried forcibly away, and baptized them as Scottish Ossian 
and Fingal ; and she would appropriate St. Patrick too. But 
even Ireland cannot claim the honor of his birth — she can 
only claim his heart and his life of piety. 

Bat why are there any who doubt concerning his existence ? 
Suppose, if you can, that all the books which mention the 
name, or treat of the history of America, should be destroyed, 
or the few that might escape, have, from long obscurity, their 
authenticity doubted ; suppose that ten or twelve centuries of 
doubt and suspicion should roll their oblivious waves over the 
few remnants saved from Vandal hands ; and suppose that 
still Washington counties, and Washington towns, and Wash- 
ington mountains, should dot the country over, in spite of 



22 

every attempt to extinguish the name ; that Washington's 
name should still continue a watchword, and that every family 
circle should have it among them, and on their tongues, 
known and heard by all men ; could any one doubt that a 
Washington had once existed ? Yet such is the case with Pat- 
rick ; numerous cathedrals bear his honored name, and point 
to heaven, where his spirit dwells, for confirmation of his 
existence. The wells and islands, the lakes and mountains, 
the towns and cities, stamp his name and history indelibly on 
the soil. Every family, in filial reverence for the saint, has its 
Patrick. His name still lives in the hearts of the people. If 
these facts are not enough to convince any man of St. Patrick's 
existence, I must leave him to hopeless infidelity. The great 
Usher, of Ireland, and Camden, of England, together with 
Whittaker, Keating, Mosheim, Harris, Ware, Bale, the ven- 
erable Bede, and several others, have referred to him as a 
real, and not an imaginary character. Usher enumerates six- 
ty-six biographies by different authors. He must be sceptical 
indeed, who can hold out against all these authorities. 

As regards the miracles said to have been performed by St. 
Patrick, I have but little to say. I see not how we can be- 
lieve in the existence of miracles at all, and deny that they 
may have been performed by Patrick. If he was the chosen 
Apostle of God, sent to convince a pagan nation of their folly, 
and to turn them to the ways of truth, and if miracles were 
necessary, can we say that God's arm was shortened, or his 
will thwarted ? About his banishing the snakes, every one 
will have his own opinion. It is undeniably true, however, 
that snakes do not live there. If we say that this was so, 
even before the advent of Patrick, we still leave the question 
open, Why is it so 1 If Patrick did not banish them, who 
did 1 Why are they absent, though present in colder climates ? 
Why is Irish soil taken, even at this time, to Wales and other 
places, to keep away serpents, and why is it that it really 
keeps them way ? Why is it that Irish clay has been known 
to kill snakes ? We may not be able to answer these ques- 



23 

tions ; and yet I must be permitted to say, that I cannot doubt 
concerning the miracles of St. Patrick, any more than I can t 
about those of the sacred writings. If there is an overruling 
Providence in the affairs of men, he cannot look with indiffer- 
ence on the efforts of his saints in his cause. I cannot doubt 
that God's hand was in Patrick's slavery, as in Joseph's cap- 
tivity ; or that the same Being who sent the latter miraculously 
to Egypt, to prepare bread for his servants there, may have 
interfered to send the former to Ireland, to break the bread of 
life to a benighted people. But if, still, there are unbelievers 
among us, there is yet another explanation. The spirits 
which Patrick saw, and the " voice of the Irish" calling him to 
come for their deliverance, might readily be seen and heard 
in a dream. The drowned child which he restored to life, 
may not have been too long under water to recover ; and the 
story of the serpents and toads assembling on Croagh-Patrick, 
to be expelled by the saint from the island, may have easily 
arisen from the civilization and Christian spirit which he intro- 
duced. The banishing of superstition, and the overthrow of 
Idolatry and its bloody rites, might truly give rise to a belief 
in the existence of miracles wrought by him. 

The 17th of March, you know, is St. Patrick's day. It is 
the day of his death and canonization. On the 17th of March, 
A. D. 465, he died. His funeral obsequies lasted for a long 
time. Every bishop and priest wished to assist in the holy 
ceremonies ; and so the rites were continued without inter- 
ruption. The torches kept burning, dispelled the darkness of 
night, and made the whole time one perpetual day. 

Such is the origin of the day we are now celebrating. What 
a pity that it should not be remembered in a way more becoming 
the great apostle ; that all Irishmen should not forget party 
differences and sectarian bigotry, and think only of country 
on such a day ! Some Irishmen appear to be afraid of cele- 
brating the day, for fear they might thereby encourage Popery. 
If Popery increases by cultivating a holy reverence for the 
benefactors of mankind, then I go for encouraging the growth 



24 

of Popery. Is there here a man, an American, who will say 
that Carroll, of Carrollton, should not be remembered, for fear 
of encouraging Popery, for he was a Catholic ? Will Irish- 
men cease to venerate Mac Nevin, that they may prevent the 
growth of Popery ? Enough for me to know that he is a 
benefactor to my native land, to make me honor him, whether 
he believed in Catholicism or in Protestantism. He cannot 
be a patriot, who does not love the patriots and benefactors of 
his own mother country. He is not a safe member for any 
community, whose heart does not warm with love to the soil 
of his native land, and with enthusiastic reverence for its 
patriots. 

" Breathes there the man with soul so dead, 
Who never to himself hath said, 
This is my own, my native land ; 
Whose heart hath ne'er within him burned, 
As home his footsteps he hath turned, 
From wandering- on a foreign strand 1 
If such there breathe, go mark him well, 
For him no minstrel's raptures swell; 
High though his titles, proud his name, " 
Boundless his wealth, as wish can claim, 
Despite those titles, power, and pelf, 
The wretch concentered all in self, 
Living, shall forfeit fair renown, 
And doubly dying, shall go down 
To the vile dust from whence he sprung, 
Unwept, unhonored, and unsung." 

It has been the custom in some cities, and I regret to be 
compelled to say, it has been the custom here, in New Haven, 
to mock at the memory of St. Patrick. Allow me to say, 
that the patriot of one country will never try to dishonor the 
patriot of another land ; and therefore, that any person who 
insults the memory of Patrick, does all he can to prove that 
the friends of civil and religious liberty have no place in his 
affections. Americans need not wonder that Irishmen resist 
such outrages. There is a golden rule by which it can be 
explained. Let any human being, I will not say American, 



25 

who cannot appreciate the baseness of his own conduct, in 
ridiculing St. Patrick, ask himself, and let conscience answer, 
whether he could stand unmoved, in any part of the world, 
and see Washington burnt or hung in effigy. If conscience 
says that he has so far lost the feelings of an American, that 
he could see such an outrage perpetrated on the memory 
of the father of our common country, without a word, or 
more appropriately, without a blow of remonstrance, then he 
is just the person to engage in dishonoring the name of Pat- 
rick. Let me say, as one who venerates Washington, and 
Patrick, too, that I could not be a calm spectator of such an 
outrage on either, and I know that he who would insult the 
patriot, the benefactor of any other country, has a heart base 
enough to ridicule the sainted Washington, unless restrained by 
fear or interest. He shows that he has no innate love of vir- 
tue. He shows that if born in another country, his principles 
would not restrain him from calling Washington a traitor. 
Mark the man, then, my American friends, whom you may 
see deliberately going about this business, and you see a man 
who, if it was popular, would tie a rope around the neck of our 
Washington. While I yield to no man in deep and fervent 
love for Washington, I say that Patrick did more for Ireland, 
than did Washington for America. As far as the interests of 
time are less important than the concerns of eternity, so far 
was Patrick a greater benefactor to Ireland, than Washington 
to this country. If want of reflection, then, has betrayed any 
who hear me into conduct so unworthy of an American, let 
me entreat them to do so no more. Let them ask themselves, 
on the principles of the golden rule, are we doing to their 
patron and benefactor, what we could tolerate, much less wish 
them to do to ours. 

Ireland saw a long period of happiness and glory after the 
death of St. Patrick. Her hospitality to foreign students who 
came to her colleges, some of which contained at one time 
over four thousand students each, was remarkable — they were 
maintained and educated free of all expense. During the 
4 



26 

dark ages, Ireland was the great light of Europe. Charle- 
magne sought for alliance with the country. His successors 
had Irishmen, and among them, John Scotus Erigena, for in- 
structors and counselors. Scotland received her missionaries, 
England sought instruction from her, France received her 
divines, Italy bowed submissive to her teachers, and all the 
world at this time looked to her for light and knowledge. 
But the Danes that ravaged all Europe, soon found their way 
across to Ireland. Though the great Brian had defeated these 
marauders in twenty-five battles, and though they were finally 
expelled from the island, yet they left the people in a miserable 
condition. 

Soon after, in the year 1169, Henry II., by a base forgery, 
which he called a bull of Pope Adrian IV., laid claim to the 
land of Ireland. Since that time, her history may be summed 
up in one word — mis government. Talk not of slavery — boast 
not of liberty, while more than eight millions groan beneath 
oppression and accumulated wrong. Hireling ministries, fawn- 
ing for court favor, and reveling in royal luxury, care not for 
the cries of the oppressed and bleeding victims of their folly. 
When will the time come that Ireland can boast of a people 
united in her cause, as in that bright gleam of sunshine which 
she had in 1783 ? When will she resolve to tell the tyrant, as 
her party colors " blend together in one bow of peace," that 
sweet as may be home recollections, tears of tenderness, 
friendships, hopes, affections, " revenge on a tyrant is sweeter 
than all." 

Every monarch, without exception, has permitted or en- 
couraged unparalleled acts of cruelty and barbarity, among 
that long desolated people. Every monarch — unless we ex- 
cept from the black catalogue the present gracious queen, 
and even in that case, we fear man's iron heart dams up the 
fountains of woman's breast, and prevents them from over- 
flowing Ireland with the blessings of liberty and love — has 
oppressed and insulted our native land. Every experiment 
that crime could invent, or madness perform, has been tried 



27 

in Irish legislation ; and while the poor victim gasps for the 
breath of liberty — which has been abstracted from Ireland, 
by the exhaustion pump of foreign oppression, till, as far as 
the air of freedom is concerned, it has become almost a 
perfect vacuum — the heartless experimenters pursue their 
theories unmoved by its dying agonies. Sir John Davies, an 
English jurist, who was attorney-general in Ireland about the 
beginning of the seventeenth century, says, " If the same sys- 
tem of legislation, which has been pursued with respect to 
Ireland, had been adopted by Satan, in his dominions, it would 
long since have depopulated his empire !" Henry and Eliza- 
beth thrust a religion upon the people, without explaining what 
that religion was, and penal laws have ever since existed, un- 
der one shape or other, to compel the Catholics to renounce 
the religion of their fathers. Ireland's religion has been pro- 
scribed, its altars burned, its priests exiled and murdered, and 
the people, with bayonets at their breasts and daggers at their 
throats, have been dragged, unwilling worshipers, to the al- 
tar of a faith which they did not understand and could not 
receive. The apostle of their own religion, in Ireland, was 
St. Patrick ; of the new religion, it was Henry VIII. ; and 
they could. not hesitate long in making a choice. Though 
educated a Presbyterian, and though once a bigot myself, I 
thank God that I can speak from my heart this day, when I 
declare that I look upon every attempt at tampering with an- 
other man's religion, with abhorrence and detestation. 

" Shall I ask the brave soldier, who fights by my side 

In the cause of mankind, if our creeds agree 1 
Shall I give up the. friend I have valued and tried, 

If he kneel not before the same altar with me ? 
******* 
No, perish the hearts and the laws that try 

Truth, valor, or love, by a standard like this." 

It has been the policy of Ireland's enemies to keep her sons 
divided ; still, the memory of former intolerance is kept fresh 
by British statesmen. Her national color, green, is sneered 



28 

at, though it is a beautiful color. It is the color which the 
sun loves to look upon, and in which, for his own pleasure, he 
has clothed the fields, and meadows, and woods of our globe. 
Her patriots' names are reviled, her saint dishonored, and the 
very rivers that beautify her scenery, are the watchwords of 
strife. 

Vanquished Erin might well sit weeping by the river Boyne, 
formerly the beautiful stream on whose banks the sounds of 
Tara's harp were heard, celebrating the glories of the country 
and of her kings ; but now the river beneath whose waters 
the poisoned arrows of party strife are seen. 

" * When will this end, ye Powers of good' 1 

She weeping asks, for ever ; 
But only hears, from out that flood, 

The demon answer, * never.' " 

Ireland's sons, like her poetry, are a curious mixture of mel- 
ancholy and levity. The tear and the smile too often sparkle 
on the same cheek together. Her morning sun is too often 
clouded as soon as it has arisen. By a wonderful absurdity 
in the world's history, her patriots names must not be men- 
tioned in the land for which they lived and died. The harp 
is silent in her ruined halls, or buried beneath the desolations 
which strangers have scattered over the land ; or if another 
note from its chords is heard, it is but the sound of one that 
breaks to tell that still she, dying, lives. Her best population, as 
emigrants, are on the ocean, whose waves dance lightly to 
their still unvanquished music, or murmur back, with sullen 
moan, the sighs of a broken heart. The vale that is sweetest 
in the wide world, smiles not for its own natives, but is dark 
and dreary by foreign oppression. The waves of time roll 
over the wrecks of her former greatness, whose glories still 
struggle through the dark waters that entomb them. Traitors 
fill the highest offices of the land they have betrayed, and the 
faithful, who have loved and defended her, have met the dun- 
geon and the scaffold for their fidelity. The very light which 
shines on the way of glory, is a brand caught from the pile 



29 

on which her prosperity has been sacrificed. Seeming to for- 
get home, the Irishman is found in every nation and clime ; 
yet still his heart, like the faithful ivy, is clinging around 
the very ruins of his country. Erin go Bragh awakens a 
throb in every Irish heart ; and though his lips murmur the 
sad slan-lat, the smile of conscious pride for his country's 
glory, looks through the tear which falls for her sufferings. 
Ah ! little do they think, who see that smile and hear his mu- 
sic, that the heart of the emigrant is breaking, even in its 
gayest hours. The warm lay of love, the light note of joy, 
will sometimes breathe from his harp again ; but, with the last 
vibration of its mournful string, the deep sigh of sadness steals 
forth once more. The lark's gay measure is the prelude to 
the plaintive notes of the dying swan, and the wreaths which 
dress the national harp are too scanty to cover the chains that 
are upon her. And thus it "is with Irish history, character, and 
poetry. Green oases and sandy deserts, smiling sunshine and 
weeping storm, literary renown and degrading ignorance, tri- 
umphant freedom and heartless slavery, are the elements of 
her varied condition. 

Ireland has been a puzzle to statesmen and philanthropists. 
A fruitful soil, a starving population, great light and gross 
darkness, are here seen together. No nation has given to 
the world greater names, abler statesmen, more successful 
generals, more eloquent orators, more enchanting poets ; yet 
the Irishman is too often received with an open or half-con- 
cealed sneer. Once, Ireland was second to no nation, in lite- 
rary renown. To her shores, from every part of Europe, 
came many, to enjoy the privileges which she bestowed with 
an open hand. Alfred of Northumberland, if not Alfred the 
Great, went to her seminaries to complete his education. 
" Now, none so poor as to do her reverence." Her harp- 
strings are broken or silent in foreign lands. No more her 
wild music breathes responsive to the song of liberty. The 
wail of sorrow, the tumult of disaffection, the sunken eye of 
famine, have usurped the places of joy, and happiness, and 



30 

plenty. Over the wide and selfish world, many a heart-broken 
stranger wanders, far from a father's home ; or, perhaps living 
on half sustenance, that he may save something to comfort a 
fond parent, sinking under the joint influence of age and 
want ; far from those who cared for him, with no prospect 
before him, but that of transmitting to his posterity his patri- 
mony of misery and want. On the public works, in the ca- 
nals, on the railway, there are many, who, with a more benefi- 
cent fortune, might be other Currans, to light up even the 
darkness of their country's oppression with glory. No won- 
der that Irishmen dwell on the ancient history of their coun- 
try. No wonder that they tell you of Ireland's connection with 
Tyre and Egypt ; of their alliances with Noah and Joseph, 
Moses and the Pharoahs. The farther they can fly from the 
present time of darkness and sorrow, is the better for them. 

England has now been connected with Ireland nearly seven 
centuries. The seven seals, mentioned in Revelations, have 
a wonderful similarity to these seven centuries of misgov- 
ernment. Almost every seal has something descriptive of 
the transactions in Ireland during the corresponding century. 
When the pale horse went out, after the opening of the fourth 
seal, and he that sat thereon was Death, and Hell followed in 
the rear, it is truly descriptive of the carnage and desolation 
which misgovernment scattered over Ireland during the fourth 
century of English usurpation, from Edward IV. to Eliza- 
beth. The seventh seal was not opened — the seventh century 
is not closed. In 1169, English steel first pierced the victim ; 
in 1800, English gold silenced the wailings of expiring free- 
dom. This long connection has been an unhappy one. The 
courtship has been marked by hard feelings, hard words, and 
even by blows from both sides. It began in deceit, was car- 
ried on with mutual misunderstanding, and ended in bitter 
jealousy. The bridal veil could not hide the tears, and the 
wine which flowed at the wedding feast was the innocent 
blood of her murdered patriots. Her heart could not be won — 
it was betrayed. She was forced into an unsought alliance ; 



31 

and her heartless wooer having bribed, banished, or killed her 
friends, gave her his hand in union, stained with her blood and 
dripping with her tears. As yet there has been no honey- 
moon — no sweet interchange of confiding love. Petitions have 
been presented for a divorce ; but as he is the tribunal to 
which the appeal is made, fears are entertained that they will 
be rejected. 

No nation has suffered so much, for so little in return, as 
faithful Ireland. While Scotland was selling her king, and 
England erecting the scaffold for his execution, Ireland stood 
firm to her loyalty, in defense of the lawful sovereign ; but the 
people that rule her destiny have strangely called these acts 
of loyalty, rebellion, and their own rebellion, loyalty. The 
history of Ireland is not the history of her own people, but a 
recital of the cruelties of her oppressors. Her lands were par- 
celed out to foreigners by spoliation. Even Meath was taken 
from the native princes, and Tara, where St. Patrick preached, 
where Brian reigned, and where the harp of Erin once shed 
the soul of Music through its storied halls, was desecrated by 
Norman upstarts, who murdered the rightful owners, for dis- 
puting their claims to what did not belong to them. Brutal 
murders, and insults to females, were justified because the 
victims were " mere Irish." Laws were made then, and are 
practised now, that when the Irish have worn themselves out 
with labor in England, they should be sent home to starve on 
a shore still dear to them, though desolated by foreign op- 
pression and misgovernment. In the reign of Henry VI., a 
law was enacted compelling Irishmen to keep out of Eng- 
land. Ireland would have been happy, had a law been made 
to keep Englishmen out of Ireland. But native Englishmen, 
from the highest office of Lord Lieutenant, to the lowest 
livery servant, are eating up the substance, while they are 
slandering the character of Ireland. Churches have been 
burned, and the perpetrators, when brought to trial, have 
pleaded in their justification, that they supposed the bishops 
or priests were in them. The catalogue of Christian churches 



32 

burned in the eighteenth century, under the dishonored name 
of Protestantism, is enough to cover any nation, or any re- 
ligion, in disgrace. I hope, that while we profess to be a 
Christian people, we shall never lay unholy hands upon tem- 
ples dedicated to the service of the living God, nor add blas- 
phemy to crime, by claiming that these acts are done for the 
glory of that religion which we should thus dishonor. We 
have had too much cause to fear it, yet we hope that public 
opinion will stamp its eternal anathema upon such barbarity. 
Let th? monument of Bunker Hill no longer overlook the black- 
ened monument of barbarity on Mount Benedict, casting a 
gloom around the scenery which should be exclusively conse- 
crated to the genius of liberty and toleration. 

In Ireland, extirpation has been preached for gospel, and 
murder for salvation. Sages sat in council to frame laws for 
preventing the growth of popery ; but popery grows in Ire- 
land as naturally as potatoes. Whether the religion of Ire- 
land is right or wrong, she is at least constant in her attach- 
ment to it. " The curse of Cromwell" could not make her 
waver. Though the Catholic priests were hunted as foxes, 
they still stood by their flocks, not counting their lives dear 
to them. All other sects, while fighting with each other, 
entered into a holy alliance to kill the Catholic for the glory of 
God and the good of religion. The day that Ireland was 
humbled, and her brave native troops conquered by foreign 
soldiers, who sold their blood and sinews to the highest bid- 
der, has been made a day of jubilee. I give no opinion on the 
Catholic religion, I only state a historical fact, when I say that 
the Catholics of Ireland have ever been the patriots. Protes- 
tants have always, as a body, except in 1783 as volunteers, 
fought against the liberty and independence of Ireland. 
Through all the dark history of Irish oppression, we defy the 
libeler to point to a single martyr made by the Irish Catho- 
lics, except in self-defense, which God and nature justify them 
in doing. We defy him to point to a single ungenerous act. 
A fallen foe was never insulted. The female sex was inva- 



33 

riably respected. We defy the enemies of Ireland to show 
where a female was insulted, even in the sack of cities, by 
Irish Catholics. But their revilers cannot say as much for 
themselves. 

Ireland is not what Providence designed her to be, but what 
tyranny has made her. Her history has been defiled : the pen 
has been dipped in the gall of falsehood, but the red blood of 
the calumniated victim reddens the record which the historian 
would fain make black. Though the robber is now revered, 
and the patriot sleeps unhonored in the grave, yet this state of 
things should not, cannot last. It is time that Emmet's epitaph 
was written, and you know that it cannot be written while 
Ireland is in bondage. The plagues of Egypt have been ne- 
cessary to open the hearts of tyrants, and when necessary 
they have come. England's national debt was first begun by 
attempts on Ireland's liberties ; it was fearfully increased in 
forging chains to bind this country, and it may yet be used as 
a self-made instrument to punish her for her sins, unless she 
repents and brings forth the fruits of repentance. Ireland, 
insulted by the ignorance, plundered by the rapacity, and slan- 
dered by the malice of her oppressors, will yet be " great, 
glorious, and free." Streaks of light are heralding the morn- 
ing of her glory. MatjILhew and O'Connell are the moral 
levers by which she has been elevated. Father Mattljiew is 
making materials for O'Connell's hands to form into a free 
people. The great temperance apostle is second only to the 
saint in whose name we are this day assembled. Whiskey has 
been a withering curse to Ireland. The " coiled and leaden 
serpent," " the worm of the still," have poisoned more people 
than all the snakes in America could have done. When Irish 
and ardent spirits are mingled, an effervescence of brick-bats 
and shillelahs may be expected. But Father Matthew, though 
some have sneered at him as a Catholic, asking, like their pre- 
decessors of old, whether any good thing can come out of 
Nazareth, will continue his glorious Reformation, till Ireland 
is freed from these venomous things. 
5 



34 

I cannot in justice close my remarks on Ireland, without 
making an observation on a theme too much overlooked — I 
mean the character of Irishwomen. Good as some of the traits 
in the character of Irishmen are, the daughters of Erin are 
more remarkable for their virtues. You may search the world, 
and you cannot find a nation where the female character is so 
admirable, in spite of so many disadvantages. I might men- 
tion their tenderness, care, and fidelity at the dying bed ; I 
might mention their undying attachment to the children even 
of strangers committed to their care ; I might mention their 
virtues, which cast a halo of glory around the poverty through 
which they struggle, still keeping an unblemished reputation ; 
and might appeal to Americans, who know and acknowledge 
that these things are so. Aye, and I might mention their 
beauty too, without charge of flattery. But lest my word 
might be doubted, I shall give you a portrait drawn by a 
master hand, of an Irish lady of the olden time, and can assure 
you that you might find many copies in the same country, in 
our own day. 

Fingal, hearing that his son Ossian, the Poet and Warrior, 
was attached to a lady of Caledonia, thus remonstrated in favor 
of an Irish girl : — " My son, of the noble line of Heremonian 
Heroes, thou gallant descendant of Erin's kings, the down of 
youth grows on thy cheek ; martial renown is loud in thy 
praise ; Romans fear thee — their eagles were dazzled by the 
lightning of thy spear : they flew before thee like timid birds 
before the hawks of Leinster. Is it in the morning of thy 
fame, bright with the sunbeams of martial glory, that thou 
wouldst ally thyself with the daughter of the Pict, and thus 
sully the royal purity of Milesian blood ? Thy country is proud 
of thy exploits, and the royal virgins of Erin sigh for thy love. 
Cormac's bards sing of the deeds of thy bravery in the strife of 
the mighty. O then, Ossian of dulcet harmony, listen to the 
voice of thy father. Albanian maids are fair, but fairer and 
lovelier are the chaste daughters of thine own wave-washed 
Isle of wood-crested hills. Go to thy happy Isle, to Branno's 



35 

grass-covered field. Ever- Allen, the most brilliant gem in the 
diadem of female loveliness, the trembling dove of innocence, 
and the daughter of my friend, deserves thy attachment. The 
pure blood of Milesius glows in her guileless heart, and flows 
in her blue veins. Majestic beauty flows around her as a robe 
oflight, and modesty, as a precious veil, heightens her youthful 
charms. She is as lovely as the mountain flower, when the 
ruddy beams of the rising sun gleam on its dew-gemmed side. 
Go take thy arms, embark in yonder dark-bosomed ship, which 
will soon bear you over ocean's foam to green Branno's streamy 
vales, where you will win a pure virgin heart, that never yet 
heaved with a sigh of love. For thee the vernal rose of passion 
will first effuse its sweetness through her sighs, and blush in all 
its beauty on her cheek." 

But though much more might be said upon Irishmen at 
home, yet, as time hastens, let us look, for a few minutes, at 
the Irishman in this country. We have dwelt at length upon 
that side of the picture where Irishmen and St. Patrick ap- 
pear; let us cross the Atlantic, and view the side where Wash- 
ington and Montgomery are seen. 

Seventeen hundred seventy-six was a wonderful era in the 
history of the world. It was the day of Washington, Mont- 
gomery, and Jefferson, for America ; and for Ireland, it was 
the morning of her Grattan, her Curran, and her Emmet. 
But though liberty, in Ireland, was taken from the cradle which 
Grattan rocked, to an early grave, over which he wept, yet, 
as sure as to-morrow's sun will rise, there will be a day of 
glorious resurrection. In the mean time, we meet here, under 
the auspices of young liberty, whose cradle was rocked by 
many of the countrymen of Grattan, to rejoice over Ireland's 
glory, and to weep over her fall. But the question has been 
more than once asked, " What business have Irishmen to come 
here ?" I shall attempt an answer, if not even now too late. 

This country owes its present position in the world, chiefly 
to the three following causes: 1. The declared determination 
to be INDEPENDENT. 2. The valor of her army and navy, 



36 

in sustaining that Declaration of Independence. 3. Her in- 
ternal improvements and productive wealth. Have Irish- 
men, then, been instrumental in producing any or all of these 
three causes of our present proud position in the world? 
Among those who signed that immortal instrument, the Decla- 
ration of Independence, I might mention several, who were 
born in this country, and therefore native Americans, whose 
parents had come from Ireland a short time before their birth. 
Edward Rutledge, a signer from South Carolina, was the 
youngest son of Doctor John Rutledge, who emigrated from 
Ireland a few years before Edward was born. The republican 
principles instilled into his young American heart, warmed by 
Irish blood, fitted him to take a prominent stand in urging In- 
dependence on South Carolina, a great many of whose inhab- 
itants, particularly those in the mercantile interest, were op- 
posed to an open rupture with the mother country. The prin- 
ciples which he advocated prevailed, and he, after signing his 
name to that instrument, was elected to the office of governor 
of the State, and was also appointed Senator in the United 
States Congress. Thomas McKean, a signer from Delaware, 
was the son of Irish parents. He performed important ser- 
vices, both in Congress and in the army, and was afterwards 
governor of Pennsylvania for nine years. George Read, of 
Delaware, a distinguished signer, was likewise the son of Irish 
parents. Nor would I forget to mention that Irish blood 
flowed in the veins of Thomas Lynch, Jun., of South Caro- 
lina, and warmed the heart of Carroll of Carrollton, who, to 
use the slang of the present day, was a Jesuit ; for he studied 
six years at the English Jesuits' College at St. Omer's, (where 
O'Connell, in more modern times, was educated,) and one year 
at the French Jesuits' College at Rheims. He was the 
last lingerer on earth of that glorious band of patriots, whose 
actions blessed the world, and whose fame adds glory to the 
skies. 

But there are other signers of the Declaration of Indepen- 
dence, who were not only sons of Irishmen, but Irishmen 



37 

themselves. Matthew Thornton, of New Hampshire, was 
a native of Ireland. He was appointed first president of the 
government formed in that Province on the abdication of 
Governor Wentworth, and occupied the highest offices in the 
gift of the people of New Hampshire, and was one of the 
three signers from that State. George Taylor, a signer from 
Pennsylvania, was born and educated in Ireland. Though 
the son of a clergyman, in his native land, he came to this 
country without money and without friends, and, on his arri- 
val, was sold to a Mr. Savage, for money to pay the expenses 
incurred in carrying him to this country. He rose gradually 
from obscurity, and after the death of Mr. Savage, married 
his widow and inherited his property. In 1776, when the vote 
was taken by the delegations from the several colonies, that 
from Pennsylvania had only one in favor of declaring this 
country's independence, owing to the prevalence of the pacific 
principles of the distinguished founder of that colony. A new 
election was therefore necessary, in the places of those op- 
posed to hostilities. Two Irishmen, among others, were ap- 
pointed, of whom Taylor was one. The other was James 
Smith, who emigrated to Pennsylvania while quite a young 
man. Mr. Smith was not only distinguished among the sup- 
porters of the Declaration of Independence, but he had the 
honor of organizing the first company of volunteers raised in 
Pennsylvania for opposing the British. This was the begin- 
ning of that band of heroes, called the Pennsylvania Line, 
who, in the language of the London Morning Chronicle, 
" fought most bitterly against the English army," and, as ap- 
pears from evidence taken before the British House of Lords, 
their number was about twenty thousand. This Pennsylva- 
nia Line, as may be seen in one of Mr. Madison's letters, pub- 
lished in the Madison papers, complained of abuses and hard- 
ships to which they were subjected ; and though, while in a 
mutiny in New Jersey, they had offers, made by a British 
agent, of full pardon from his majesty, if they would leave the 
government which had thus wronged them, they refused the offer 



38 

with indignity, choosing to cling to the country which, in their 
opinion, had insulted them, rather than receive the favor of a 
monarch, at the expense of their adopted country's indepen- 
dence. In bringing about the revolution in the sentiments of 
the people of Pennsylvania, Col. Smith was one of the most 
active and influential agents. He signed the Declaration of 
Independence, after he had brought the minds of the people to 
coincide with the measure, and he raised up a brave soldiery, 
chiefly his own countrymen, to shed their blood in its defense. 

But there was one who, though not a signer of the Dec- 
laration of Independence, must not be forgotten here. Charles 
Thomson was an Irishman. He came to this country with 
his three brothers, and when the first Continental Congress 
assembled in 1774, was chosen Secretary of that venerable 
body. He continued to discharge the duties of that office for 
fifteen years. Having sat in council with the fathers of this 
Republic till its Independence was declared, till its battles were 
fought, till its Constitution was adopted, and till he had the 
honor — the highest ever Secretary had — of announcing to 
George Washington that he was unanimously elected chief 
magistrate of a free people, he resigned his office, in 1789. 
When elected Secretary of Congress, he was forty-four years 
of age ; but Providence blessed him with a long life, that he 
might see the fruits of his labors ripen. For half a century 
after the first Congress assembled, he remained among a 
grateful people. In 1808, he published a translation of the 
Septuagint, in four volumes ; and died in the full enjoyment of 
his faculties, at the age of ninety-four. I think, therefore, that 
these facts are sufficient to show that Irishmen had something 
to do with the Declaration of Independence. 

But besides declaring this country free, it was necessary to 
sustain that declaration. Did Irishmen assist in this ? In the 
army, I need scarcely remind you, that Montgomery was an 
Irishman. On your banner he is represented as delivering to 
America the record of his services, while Ireland points with 
pride to one who had done so much for the cause of freedom. 



39 

Though Montgomery had resolved to retire from public life, 
and devote himself to rural pursuits on his farm in Duchess 
County, New York ; yet Congress saw that the services of 
such a man were wanted, and he was therefore appointed 
brigadier general. After receiving information of his appoint- 
ment, in writing to a friend he said, " The Congress having 
done me the honor of electing me a brigadier general in their 
service, is an event which must put an end for a while — per- 
haps for ever — to the quiet scheme of life I had prescribed for 
myself. For though unexpected and undesired by me, yet the 
will of an oppressed people, compelled to choose between liberty 
and slavery, must be obeyed." He did obey ; and owing to the 
sickness of General Schuyler, the chief command of the north- 
ern department of the continental army devolved on Mont- 
gomery. You all know his melancholy fate in 1775, at Quebec, 
where he had fought under Wolfe in 1759, as a British officer. 
But as long as a love for valor and patriotism remains, General 
Montgomery will not be forgotten. 

Many others, among the most honored of the Revolutionary 
leaders, were Irishmen ; but on the present occasion, I cannot 
even glance at their history. In both our wars with England, 
they have remembered their oppressors, and have fought man- 
fully for the land of their adoption. In 1783, Mr. Gardiner, 
afterwards Lord Mountjoy, said in the Irish Parliament, that 
" England had America detached from her by Irish emigrants." 
The late Dr. Mac Nevin says that one of the pretexts for 
refusing emancipation to the Irish Catholics, was the fact, 
that sixteen thousand of them fought on the side of America. 
The Pennsylvania Line, as I have said, included a great many 
Irishmen, of whom a large proportion were Presbyterians, 
from Ulster. The navy of America, likewise owes much of 
its fame to Irishmen, both in the first and second war with 
England. Commodore John Barry, an Irishman, was the 
father of the American Navy. After serving in the Revolu- 
tionary War, he superintended the building of the frigate 
" United States," of which he was afterwards commander. 



40 

When hailed by a British frigate, " What ship is that ?" he 
replied, " The frigate United States, saucy Jack Barry, com- 
mander, half Irishman, half Yankee — who are you?" During 
the Revolutionary War, when the ice prevented his movements 
in the navy, he fought in the army, rather than remain inactive. 
Captain Johnston Blakeley, commanding the Wasp, was an 
Irishman. The Reindeer and the Avon, of the British navy, 
struck their colors to this brave, but ill-fated vessel. The 
gallant crew, with their daring commander, were lost at sea 
soon after the engagement with the Avon. 

If any thing more was necessary to prove that Irishmen 
were distinguished in sustaining what Thornton, Smith, and 
Taylor had declared, I might refer to the commanders of the 
army and navy in all our struggles, for their opinions on the 
services rendered by Irishmen to America in her hour of need. 
I shall quote but one sentence from Col. Johnson's speech, de- 
livered at Lexington, Kentucky, a few weeks since. Gallant 
old Tecumseh says : " I have, with some of you, my fellow- 
citizens, fought by the side of the Irishman in the ranks of 
liberty, under the star spangled banner, against the Christian 
oppressor, as well as the savage foe. I have fought under the 
bird of Jove — the abiding eagle — by the side of the sons of the 
Emerald isle. I have seen the Irishman fall in the ranks, and 
thank his God that he had one life to give to the cause of 
American freedom, and regret that he had not another life to 
lose for her sake. I have witnessed many an instance of their 
bravery in the field, and I know this country is largely indebt- 
ed for its liberties to the brave and warm-hearted Irish, who 
never gave up a post but with their lives — who were never in 
any engagement shot in their backs. I have great confidence 
in the Irish people. * * * * Blood is the price that is 
sometimes paid for liberty ; and if blood is to be shed for 
that sacred cause, there is no men on earth more ready to shed 
their blood at its sacred shrine, than Irishmen." This is the 
character which the Irish soldier and sailor have hitherto 
sustained, and if called upon now, they would prove themselves 



41 

worthy of confidence again. The Irish alone, who are now 
in this country, can defend the land of their adoption against 
the power of England, without shedding a drop of native 
blood, and they would be glad to do it, if the cause of liberty 
demanded it. The Broadway dandy and the modern ladies'- 
man, would make poor food for cannon. The hardy laborers 
of Ireland, who seize the forest in their iron grasp, and level 
it to the earth, are the kind of men upon whom America must 
depend for the soldiery who are to encamp on the cold ground 
in a winter campaign, and in the morning arise from sleep, 
refreshed, to battle for liberty. 

The third cause of prosperity, is our internal improvements 
and productive wealth. Do Irishmen assist America in this 
respect? The Irish are the real productive class of our 
citizens. They may be poor, but they usually bring with 
them some valuable addition to the riches of America. If 
they own nothing else, they at least bring with them an honest 
character, a good heart, and a sound constitution, which are 
far better than gold. They come not here as some other 
foreigners do, to hunt for fortune without deserving her smiles, 
to cultivate mustaches, or to live upon their neighbors' toil, 
without rewarding them in return. They seize the axe, and 
tame the forest ; they dig the canal, and a stream of wealth 
follows them ; they blast the rocks, and lead the railway through 
the mountain and over the valley. There is no shifting off the 
burden from their own shoulders. They come to this country 
not in search of adventures, but in search of work, and having 
found it, they go to it with right good will. The skeleton of 
this great country has been made by Irish hands. They have 
placed upon it those iron ribs and those veins and arteries of 
wealth and commerce. Their shoulders have carried the 
brick, their sweat has moistened the mortar, of which our 
cities have been constructed. 

If, then, the Irish were distinguished in getting our Inde- 
pendence declared ; if they were distinguished on the battle- 
6 



42 

fields, where it was sustained ; and if they are now the chief 
dependence of the country for the toil and hardship by which 
national prosperity is secured ; I think we may justly come to 
the conclusion, that Irishmen have an inalienable right to the 
honor and blessings of American citizenship — that they are 
the most valuable part of our population. 

But Irishmen have other claims to the respect which is due 
from this country to its early benefactors. They probably knew 
this continent six centuries before Columbus saw it. Its history 
since, is the record of their labors. Berkeley left opulence and 
comfort to toil here in want and misery for the cause of 
American literature ; whose memory shall not be forgotten 
while Yale and Harvard stand to perpetuate the fame of an 
Irishman. Graham, Emmet, Mac Nevin, and Porter, with a 
list of eloquent divines, learned professors, distinguished law- 
yers, and able writers, sons of Ireland, have done honor to the 
American name. The great Edmund Burke would have been 
an American citizen, only for the tears of an aged father, who 
could not part with a beloved son. The Irish may well feel 
proud of the services which they have rendered to America ; 
and the sons of Irishmen need not fear that their character 
will be unknown, while such men as Andrew Jackson, John C. 
Calhoun, James Buchanan, and other distinguished Americans, 
are of their number. 

But it is said, that Irishmen are not patriots, because they 
leave their native country. Go tell that story over the graves 
of the pilgrim fathers ! Their honored ashes will bear witness 
against you. Native land ! There is something endearing in 
the word. Marathon, Thermopylae, Clontarf, and Bannock- 
burn, were the altars on which pure and fervent hearts have 
been sacrificed to the Deity of Native Land. But will any 
one say, that Irishmen do not love their native land, because 
they love America too ? No. There is no people in the 
world more devoted to the land of their birth. Persecution 
and poverty, time and space, cannot make them forget their 



43 

own sweet " gem of the sea." Irish love cannot be calculated 
by mathematics. The pilgrims, who were foreigners here, 
were as pure patriots as their sons, who revile and persecute 
foreigners. The Irishman and the pilgrim had the same object 
in view, in coming to this country — freedom from persecution 
and oppression. The pilgrim and the Irishman have labored 
with their own hands to level the forest and turn the wilder- 
ness into a garden. Those who oppose foreigners have been 
enjoying the fruits of the pilgrim's and the Irishman's labors, 
while they are slandering the character of both. They are 
the drones of society, nati consumere fruges, while those who 
toil for the benefit of the country are denounced as traitors 
and enemies. Irishmen here are Americans by choice. They 
are Americans, not because they grew up, like the trees of the 
forest, on their native soil ; but because they loved America, 
and preferred her as their home. And though persecutions 
and oppressions may have urged them to it, yet their love of 
liberty and of her chosen land was sufficient to break the ties 
that bound them to kindred and to home. Native Americans 
are citizens of this Republic at no sacrifice. Irishmen have 
become American citizens by rending ties dear as life ; but 
neither these nor the waves of ocean, though often tempest- 
tossed till amid their hoary strife the exile finds a final home, 
could keep them from the land of their love. It is foolish 
and unjust, then, to say that Irishmen could ever think of in- 
juring this country, which is the land of their choice, the home 
of their exiled friends, the last refuge of their friendless and 
insulted country. 

Several important questions, in law and politics, have been 
agitated, owing to the presence of Irishmen and other emi- 
grants in this country. The question is debated even in this 
age, whether a man can expatriate himself. Those who be- 
lieve that man is a part of the soil on which he is born and 
dies like a vegetable, will deny the right of expatriation. But 
those who believe that man is his own master, and no man's 



44 

vassal ; who believe that no man can take another's liberties 
away, or bind him to institutions which he detests, will grant 
the right of expatriation and locomotion. Plain as the right 
appears to be, yet it is contrary to English, and even to 
American law. The old feudal doctrine of perpetual allegi- 
ance, still remains in force. In 1807, George III. issued a 
proclamation, recalling from foreign service all seamen and 
seafaring men who were natural born subjects of Great Britain, 
and commanding them to return home under fear of pains and 
penalties. During our last war, several naturalized citizens of 
this Republic were taken prisoners, and would have been ex- 
ecuted as traitors, only for the interference of Mr. Madison. 
In the case of the Ann, (1 Dodson Reports, 221,) Sir W. Scott 
contends for the principle of perpetual allegiance. The Ann 
was captured under American colors, in the river Thames, in 
August, 1812. The master of the vessel had been admitted a 
citizen of this Republic about sixteen years before, and yet the 
judge said, " He is born in this country, [England,] and is 
subject to all the obligations imposed upon him by his nativity. 
He cannot shake off his allegiance to his native country, nor 
divest himself altogether of his British character, by a volun- 
tary transfer of himself to another country ;" and yet though 
this language was used to prove that the master of the vessel 
was a British subject, the same authority decided that his 
property should be forfeited, because he was a naturalized citi- 
zen of America. This is the English law, therefore, that a 
natural born subject of England cannot throw off his allegiance, 
though he may have his property condemned ; — that he still 
owes allegiance to a government which in return does not 
owe him protection. This, the most foolish and anti-republi- 
can doctrine of English common law, is still the law of these 
United States. Chancellor Kent says of the naturalized citi- 
zen, that " if there should be war between his parent state and 
the one to which he has attached himself, he must not arm 
himself against the parent state, and if he be recalled by his 



45 

native government he must return, or incur the pain and pen- 
alties of a contempt." This, then, is American law, that every 
naturalized citizen of this Republic may be called home by 
the parent governments, and that we must obey, or meet the 
fate of traitors. We are told that America would retaliate, by 
taking life for life, if England should hang any of our natural- 
ized citizens ; but it would be foolish to take up arms against 
a doctrine which our judges lay down as the law of the land. 
In 1795, the Judges of the Supreme Court of the United States, 
in the case of Talbot vs. Janson, recognized this doctrine. In 
1797, Chief, Justice Ellsworth, of this State, in the case of 
Isaac Williams, laid this principle down as the law of the land. 
Justice Story, in 1822, speaking in behalf of the Supreme Court 
of the United States, gave an opinion favorable to this doc- 
trine, so repugnant to the principles of a free Republic. This 
old, feudal, and barbarous doctrine is still a living principle of 
American law, laid down by our commentators, and confirmed 
by the decisions of our highest courts. 

Irishmen have given their allegiance with their hearts to 
this country ; the law which would sever their attachment to 
America, should be repealed by act of Congress. They are 
bona-fi.de citizens of this country — citizens, too, according to 
laws made by the supreme power in the American govern- 
ment. If we still owe allegiance to the parent state, why do 
our naturalization laws compel us under oath to renounce it ? 
Why make laws by an American Congress which an English 
monarch may trample on with impunity ? A war may arise 
between this country and Great Britain at no distant day. If 
such should be the case, Irishmen would arm against England, 
and would not return home, even if recalled under fear of 
pain and penalties for a contempt. The contempt would be 
mutual. The memory of oppression, which is all that Irishmen 
owe to England, would nerve every Irish arm to strike for 
liberty at every blow. Irishmen fought for this country of 
old, against England, and they would do so again, in defiance 



46 

of threats from a power which would rule them with a rod of 
tyranny at home, nor suffer them to enjoy liberty abroad. It 
is bad enough to be born under misgovernment, without owing 
to it, and to consequent rags and misery, perpetual allegiance. 

Congress should at once pass a law repudiating this doctrine. 
I know that an American Congress cannot change English 
law, but it can withdraw the sanction of this country from 
a principle so unjust to her naturalized citizens. Irishmen 
would be compelled by our laws to take up arms in defense of 
their country, as their hearts would prompt them to do. Sure- 
ly the flag under which they are called to fight, owes them 
protection ; yet it could not shield them without violating 
American law. Till Congress shall pass an act, denying that 
such a doctrine is acknowledged by America, no Irishman 
should enter either the army or the navy of this country. I 
know that this country would protect her citizens, whether 
native or adopted, but if England should hang any that she 
might take prisoners, I see not how we could complain, as 
they would be executed with the sanction of American jurists. 
Irishmen want to have this law abrogated — they do not care so 
much about their safety. They want, in the first place, to 
have our laws right, and they will live to uphold them, or die 
to defend. ~ Our government should show to the world, that 
this country, in its intercourse with other governments, will 
not recognize such a principle. Till such an act is passed, 
our naturalization laws are worse than mockery. 

Another question has been discussed, owing to the fact that 
Irishmen are mostly Catholics, whether that religion is incom- 
patible with free institutions. Being educated in the rigid 
principles of old Scotch Presbyterianism, I should once have 
argued in the affirmative of this question. When I came to 
this country, I was as great a bigot as ever lived, and I gloried 
in my shame. But I had not thought much for myself at that 
time. So thoroughly am I ashamed of my opinions and 
actions then, that I will not be held accountable for them. It 



47 

was not till after my arrival here, that I began to think for 
myself; and for the liberality of my views at present, I ascribe 
all the credit to the influence of free and tolerant institutions, 
on even a prejudiced mind. I acknowledge my fault with 
sorrow ; and yet with satisfaction too, when I know that I 
cannot be guilty in this respect again. I have made up my 
mind, after examining for myself, and neither the persecution 
I may meet from old friends, nor the unpopularity which 
certainly follows a frank avowal of tolerant principles, can 
move me from my position. I am ashamed of the opinions 
which I formerly held, but not ashamed to forsake and confess 
them, and if doing penance will help me along, I am willing to 
endure reproach and contumely, to atone for my former sins. 
The principal cause of the change in my feelings, was the 
reflection that I had despised the real benefactors of my native 
country. When I looked at the history of Ireland, I saw that 
Irish Catholics still fought on the side of Ireland. I found 
them arrayed in battle against foreign tyranny, under Sarsfield 
and Emmet, and all the other Irish patriots. I found them 
uniting cordially with Protestants as volunteers, when Prot- 
estants for once arrayed themselves on the side of Ireland. 
On the contrary, I found Protestants fighting, not to free, but 
to plunder Ireland. I found them supporting Cromwell, who 
acted in Ireland more like a fiend than a man. I found them 
joined with hired myrmidons from Germany, who fought for 
William, against the native prince and against the native army 
of the land. I found that Protestants rejoiced over the deso- 
lating march of these hired butchers, who, like the Hessians 
in the American Revolution, sold their blood and services for 
money, to crush the persecuted few who were fighting for 
their country. I found that Protestants ridiculed Ireland's 
Apostle, and sneered at the memory of Curran, Grattan, Fitz- 
gerald, Emmet, Tone, Mac Nevin, Sampson, and all the other 
patriots of Ireland, whom tyrants have called traitors. I 
professed myself an Irishman, and yet there was nothing to be 



48 

proud of in Ireland's history, but what my fellow Protestants 
despised ; and I came to the determination either to deny that 
I was an Irishman, or acknowledge that my political creed 
was different from that of the Protestant ascendancy in Ireland. 
But oh, Ireland ! if I ever deny thee, may my tongue be silent, 
and my hands fall powerless by my side ! I had, therefore, no 
alternative, but to acknowledge what I knew to be true, that 
the Irish Catholics have always been true patriots, and that 
Protestants, though very good Englishmen and Scotchmen, 
with a few honorable exceptions were bad Irishmen. In say- 
ing this, I give no opinion on the Catholic religion — I only state 
what I believe to be historical truth. I could not hold to the 
politics of Irish Protestantism, unless I was to deny that Irish- 
men ever had a name that they should be proud of; unless I 
was willing to fall in with the attempts, at one time to ridicule 
St. Patrick, at another time to deny his existence, and at 
another time to assert that he was a Protestant. That Pat- 
rick was a Protestant, I cannot believe, even on the authority 
of Usher, unless I believe that Protestants acknowledge Rome 
as their supreme see, celebrate mass, immolate the host, offer 
prayers for the dead, believe in a middle state of existence 
after this life, pray to the virgin Mary and other saints, fast on 
particular days of the week, perform pilgrimages, and believe 
in absolution and auricular confession ; for such was the faith 
of the followers of St. Patrick. 

But, viewing the subject in an unprejudiced light, let us in- 
quire whether Catholicism is repugnant to free institutions ? — 
whether our liberties are in danger by the increase of Popery 
in our land 1 In this country we profess to be very liberal in 
our opinions, and to advocate a full toleration of all religious 
denominations ; and yet I think I may safely assert, that Cath- 
olics have suffered persecution in this free country, and are 
still suffering, from a profession of their faith. Civil disabili- 
ties do not, in this country, follow by law, but they follow in 
fact, a certain kind of religious belief. I know that many 



49 

Protestants would vote against a Catholic, and for his Protes- 
tant opponent, all other things being equal. It is not many- 
years since, in New England, the Pope and the Devil were 
associated together, and a pious Puritan drew but short breath 
in presence of a Catholic. The prejudices brought over to 
Plymouth by the Puritan associates of Cromwell, have not 
been banished from the minds of their descendants. How- 
ever much I admire some traits in the character of the Puri- 
tans, I may safely say, that they had a great many strong 
prejudices, which sometimes developed themselves in perse- 
cuting and hanging those who did not agree with them in 
their peculiar views. A good old lady in this city, asked me, 
soon after my arrival here, whether I was a Catholic ; and 
learning that I was a true blue Presbyterian, she thanked God 
that I had not come to burn her up ! A very amiable and ac- 
complished lady, in New York city, lives in the constant fear 
that the Catholics will gain power in this country, and bring 
back the inquisition. When I visit that city, I always try to 
alleviate her sufferings, by pledging my life for hers. I doubt 
whether a more intolerant transaction ever took place in any 
Catholic country, than happened in this city, not a year ago, 
where a young man, who had said, while engaged in a warm 
controversy on the merits of Catholicism, " I'd swear the Cath- 
olics are as tolerant as the other sects," was solemnly im- 
peached and tried for profane swearing ! ! To the honor of 
the tribunal before which he was brought, I believe the Rev- 
erend plaintiff lost the suit. What was done with the case 
afterwards, my curiosity did not lead me to inquire. I sup- 
pose, however, that the charge was changed from false swear- 
ing to flat burglary, and then Dogberry, of course, would 
pronounce the defendant guilty. 

But Protestantism has been as intolerant, whenever it has 
had the power, as Catholicism. Surely, Henry VIII. and Eli- 
zabeth were as intolerant as Mary of England, or Mary Queen 
of Scots. In England, where Protestantism had the majority, 



50 

many martyrs have died at the stake. In Ireland, where Cath- 
olicism had the power, there were no martyrs, except those 
who lost their lives through English misgovernment and op- 
pression. If there was a martyred Ridley, there was also a 
martyred Servetus. The colony of Maryland was surely as 
tolerant as any of the New England, colonies. I speak only 
with the voice of impartial history, when I say, that the Cath- 
olics in this country have been the warmest friends of civil 
and religious liberty. While the Puritans of New England 
and other Protestants were persecuting the unoffending Qua- 
kers, the Roman Catholics of Maryland were passing an act 
which said that " No person within this province, professing 
to believe in Jesus Christ, shall be any ways troubled, mo- 
lested, or discountenanced, for his or her religion, or in the 
free exercise thereof." And thus it was that the victims of 
persecution and intolerance found an asylum in a Catholic 
colony. Bancroft, the learned and eloquent American his- 
torian, says, " The disfranchised friends of Prelacy from Mas- 
sachusetts, and the Puritans from Virginia, were welcomed to 
equal liberty of conscience and political rights, in the Roman 
Catholic province of Maryland." " From France came Hu- 
guenots ; from Germany, from Holland, from Sweden, from 
Finland, I believe from Piedmont, the children of misfortune 
sought protection under the tolerant scepter of the Roman 
Catholic." 

Had the question been asked, whether Protestantism and 
Puritanism are inimical to American freedom 1 we might, with 
more justice, reply in the affirmative. No Catholic has ever 
been proved a traitor to American liberty, has ever assisted 
in burning a religious institution, or persecuted for a difference 
of religious faith in this country. But Protestants have done 
all these things. The asylum of freedom in Maryland, reared 
and protected by Catholics, was overturned by Protestants, as 
soon as they got the power in that colony. Bancroft informs 
us, that while " the Roman Catholic was inflexible in his re- 
gard for freedom of worship," as soon as Protestant bigotry 



51 

gained the ascendancy, ;t Roman Catholics were disfranchised 
in the province which they had planted." " They alone were 
disfranchised on the soil which, long before Locke pleaded for 
toleration, or Penn for religious freedom, they had chosen, not 
as their asylum only, but, with Catholic liberality, as the asy- 
lum of every persecuted sect. In the land which Catholics 
had opened to Protestants, the Catholic inhabitant was the 
sole victim to Anglican intolerance. Mass might not be said 
publicly. No Catholic priest or bishop might utter his faith 
in a voice of persuasion. No Catholic might teach the young. 
If the wayward child of a Catholic would but become an 
apostate, the law wrested for him, from his parents, a share of 
their property. Such were the methods adopted ' to prevent 
the growth of Popery.' " It is strange that a sect which has 
often trampled on civil and religious liberty here, should so far 
forget the history of their own intolerance, as to seek a con- 
troversy with a religion which, as far as this country is con- 
cerned, has been the earliest and best friend of religious liberty 
and toleration. 

The Westminster Confession of Faith, which, as true Presby- 
terians, we are bound to believe, damns more men than all the 
decrees which the Church of Rome has ever issued. The fa- 
mous decree of the council of Lateran was merely a judicial de- 
cision on a single case, not applicable to sovereigns in general, 
and no more authorizes the deposing of sovereigns by the Pope, 
than the killing of his wives by Henry VIII., imposes the 
duty of a similar amusement on his followers ! The decree 
of the council of Constance, about which we hear so much, 
on breaking faith with heretics, is a bungling forgery. And 
the infallibility of the Pope, which Protestant misrepresentation' 
makes a part of the Catholic faith, is not believed in by the 
Catholics. Their standard authorities prove the contrary. 

But we are told that the Pope and the Priests have too much 
influence over the world. I rejoice that they have exerted 
an influence over kings and emperors, that there was a power 



52 

on earth which could curb the fiery passions of those who 
tried to overturn the liberties of mankind ; that they who 
never feared the face of man, nor shed a tear of sympathy 
over human misery, were brought with faltering step, and 
bending knee, and beating heart, to bow before the vicegerent 
of that God, whose poor creatures they had so long insulted. 
But can the Ministers of God have too much influence ? I 
only wish that our clergy had a little more control over 
their flocks. If we were more attentive to their teachings, 
there would be less of crime and misery on the earth. If we 
would follow more strictly their advice, we should be less 
wicked than we are. The great fault with us Protestants, is, 
that our clergy have not enough of influence over us. We 
profess to believe them as the messengers of God, but infi- 
delity is seen beneath our pretended faith. We say that our 
Ministers are the messengers of God, and yet we will not 
permit them to speak as their conscience bids them. They 
must speak the message of God in such a way that the com- 
mand will coincide with our inclinations ; or if they do not 
pamper our prejudices, we cashier them, stop their pay, and 
get more pliant hirelings. This want of respect for the Min- 
isters of God, fills our Protestant ranks with infidels, of which 
there are few among the Catholics. Why, then, should we 
try to make them infidels too ? If they are miserable in this 
world, let them enjoy the prospect of a blissful immortality 
beyond the grave. If tyranny has doomed them to misery 
here, take not away from them that faith which tells them of 
a home of liberty, where tyrants shall be unknown. 

It is said that they cannot be good American citizens, be- 
cause they acknowledge obedience to a foreign power, and 
are under the control of the Pope. But it is sufficient to say, 
that they do not acknowledge the temporal power of the 
Pope. They obey his spiritual power, and Protestants are 
guilty here too, because they claim to believe in a power from 
heaven, which is above that of the United States. Democracy 



53 

in politics will do very well : a democratic religion is not re- 
cognized in the Bible. No people are more free from foreign 
influence, than the Irish Catholics. The address of O'Connell, 
whom they reverence, as Americans reverence Washington, 
falls powerless, and no one obeys when he tells them to inter- 
fere with our domestic institutions : if, indeed, that address is 
any thing but a forgery, got up to deceive the Irish ; but 
whether forged or genuine, it has had no influence. 

The Catholics have been represented in every light. We 
say that they care not for oaths, and yet test oaths have been 
sufficient to shut the door of earthly honors in their faces. If 
we indulge them, it is said they will be traitors, though injus- 
tice and insult have failed to make them so. But it is a cool 
piece of impudence to intermeddle with another man's faith, 
and calculate his chances for salvation. As Rosseau said to 
philosophy, so we might say to bigotry : " What pains thou 
takest to contract the heart, and lessen human nature." Some 
writers damn without difficulty all the sages of antiquity. 
Montague, a chaplain of Charles I., was censured by the 
Commons of England for saying that virtuous Catholics might 
be saved; and many now hold the opinion that no Catholic 
can be saved. Some, in their holy hatred of Popery, would 
almost do wrong, if that wrong would only oppose Catholicism. 
To argue with such persons is no use. Argument contracts 
their understanding, as light contracts the pupil of the eye. 
Their faith is as contracted as the neck of a vinegar cruet ; 
their doctrines as sour as its contents. Such men would 
imitate the Siamese, who blacken their own teeth, because 
they think the devil's are white ! 

Would it not be better to live in peace than in continual wars, 
to reconcile differences rather than seek for new causes of strife? 
The spirit of the age is driving every thing into extremes : 
abolition, woman's rights, dietetics, temperance, and every 
other thing is now driven onward by steam, till the machinery 
is smashed, and lives lost in the explosion. The early sup- 



54 

porters of a cause are soon distanced by hotter heads with 
Jess brains, and then the founders are persecuted for not seeing 
as these upstarts see. Would it not be better to blunt the 
thorns of grief in this world, than to sharpen them for the 
next ? The time and talent spent in preaching down Popery, 
might have enlightened the world with science. Better to 
teach the duties of this life, than to deal out damnation in the 
next ; better to preach " peace on earth and good will to 
men," than madly force mankind to turn their swords into 
each others' hearts. The Catholics have not retaliated by 
getting up crusades against the Protestant religion. What 
would we say, if they should do to us as we have done to 
them ? What would the Puritans have said, if the Catholics 
had usurped dominion in their colonies, and suppressed the 
Puritan worship on the rock of Plymouth, as was done in 
Maryland to the Catholics ? The Catholic religion goes quietly 
along, without using hard words and denunciations against those 
who will not believe its faith. It does not live by excitement, 
as the bigoted itinerants of other denominations do, who de- 
pend on the indignation which their foul slander creates, for 
their notoriety. The tithing men are not employed so much 
at Catholic chapels, as at Protestant churches. Nor do our 
Justices of the Peace, who live upon the corruption of society, 
enjoy such profits from Catholic, as from Protestant meetings, 
from those whom insolence, under the insulted name of religion, 
has dragged before the bar for disturbing public worship. In 
my travels over this country, I have found none more tolerant 
than the Catholics. I have found them liberal and kind, fixed 
in their religious belief, yet willing to extend to others the 
privileges which they claimed for themselves ; and by their 
Priests, I have heard the most tolerant principles advocated. 

A friend, whom I shall always love and honor, told me, 
when leaving home, that he expected soon to hear that I had 
changed my opinions when I came to America, as others had 
done. I told him there was no danger. But truth and knowl- 



55 

edge are stronger than the chains of early prejudice. Here I 
stand, to-day, a proof that bigotry can be conquered by the 
influence of free institutions. I have learned to despise all 
" sects who monopolize bliss," I have learned to feel for 

" The victim of that canting crew, 
So smooth, so godly, yet so develish too ; 
Who, armed at once with prayer-books and with whips, 
Blood on their hands, and scripture on their lips ; 
Tyrants by creed and torturers by text ; 
Make this life Hell, in honor of the next .'" 

" Enough for me, whose heart has learned to scorn 
Bigots, alike in Rome or England bom. 

***** 
Enough for me, to weep and laugh by turns, 
As mirth provokes or indignation burns." 

Here would " I swear by my soul's hope of rest, 
I'd rather have been born, ere man was blest 
With the pure dawn of Revelation's light ; 
Yes, rather plunge me back in Pagan night, 
And take my chance with Socrates for bliss, 
Than be the Christian of a faith like this, 
Which builds on heavenly cant its earthly sway, 
And in a convert mourns to lose a prey; 
***** 
Which, while it dooms dissenting souls to know 
Nor bliss above nor liberty below — 
Adds the slave's suffering to the sinner's fear, 
And lest he 'scape hereafter, racks him here." 
My creed be "writ on Mercy's page above ; 
By the pure hands of all atoning Love" 
Be mine, " while round me sects and nations raise 
To the one God, their varying notes of praise, 
To bless each voice, whate'er its tone may be, 
That serves to swell the general harmony." 

Another question which has been discussed, is, whether 
immigration should be discouraged, and the laws of naturali- 
zation altered. On this question I shall make two observa- 
tions : 1st, Immigration cannot be prevented ; and, 2d, It 
would be the greatest folly to refuse naturalization to immi- 
grants who wish to become American citizens. The present 



56 

term of five years' residence, is probably the best that can be 
adopted. Let the term remain settled — let the controversy 
come to an end. After a proper residence, which experience 
has shown to be the one now necessary, let them be bound to 
the Republic by the strong tie of citizenship, and they will live 
or die for her liberty. 

As an Irishman, I feel some hesitation in thus giving my 
opinion on such a question. Yet it may go for what it is 
worth. This country I believe in my heart is the ark of liberty 
for mankind. Any thing that endangers its institutions should 
be avoided. Are they, then, in danger from Irish votes ? If 
so, I think we would all forego the pleasure and privilege of 
being American citizens. But how is it possible that Irishmen 
should try to injure this country, or prove traitors to her ? 
How can they feel otherwise than grateful to a nation which 
is the asylum of their oppressed countrymen ? Infatuated 
they would be to tear down the building in which they found 
shelter and safety. They would be worthy of eternal repro- 
bation, who would lop the branches or mar the trunk of the 
majestic oak, which spreads out its thick foliage as a protection 
alike from the drenching rain and burning sun. Would it not 
be more natural that they should be the first to bare their 
bosoms to receive the dart aimed at its vitals ? Ireland is 
vocal with praises of America and her institutions. The Irish 
are cradled with hymns of praise in honor of her name. Her 
praise is the lullaby of the infant, the pride of youth, the glory 
of manhood. This is the country of their early prayers and 
constant pride; this the Eden of which in boyhood they 
dream ; this the land for which they leave father and mother 
and home. In the midst of dashing spray they crowd the 
forecastle, climb the mast, or point the telescope, eager to 
catch the first glimpse of the promised land. The Irish emi- 
grants never think that it is a foreign land : they say, in the 
language of their countryman, that, like Washington, it is " the 
boon of Providence to the human race." 



57 

As a proof of the devotion of the Irish people to America, 
I might mention that Hackett, the comedian, because he was 
an American, drew large and enthusiastic audiences in Dublin; 
while Mathews, the Englishman, confesses that he never had 
a full house in Dublin but once, and then the people knocked 
down the door-keeper and got in gratis ! When Hackett ap- 
peared in Dublin, in the play of Rip Van Winkle, and when 
the question was asked, " Did you never hear of Washington, 
the great father of his country ?" the whole audience rose with 
a universal aye to the question, and the theatre shook with 
thunders of applause at the mention of the Patriot's name. 
And this is the enthusiasm which some politicians propose to 
meet with dark suspicion, and with the chilling look of distrust. 
Opposite as are the extremes of character among the Irish, 
they will make good American citizens. Giraldus Cambrensis 
said of them, nearly seven hundred years ago, " If an Irishman 
is a good man, there is none better ;" and ungraciously adds, 
" if a bad one, none worse." This, from a slanderer of Ireland, 
is saying a good deal. An English Ecclesiastic said, three 
hundred years ago, that the Irish are a people " of bold and 
haughty spirit, sharp-witted, lively, prodigal of life, patient of 
heat and cold and want, hospitable to strangers, constant in 
their attachment, implacable in their resentment, credulous, 
greedy of glory, impatient of reproach and injury. It is their 
greatest happiness to enjoy freedom." Mr. Sadler, a member 
of the British Parliament, in our own day, says, " The courage 
of the Irish in the field has never been surpassed ; their chari- 
ty, notwithstanding their poverty, never equaled ; their char- 
acter contains the elements of whatever is elevated and noble." 
N. P. Willis observes, that " the prominent lines in the Irish 
character are an undying love of liberty, and an untamed and 
restless energy of character." Another American traveler 
expressed his opinion on the strong points of Irish character, 
by saying, " their hatred is the hatred of murder ; their love, 
the kindness and generosity of another world." 



58 

The English army and English navy, about which we hear 
so much boasting, owe their fame chiefly to the valor and en- 
terprise of Irishmen. The army of England is prosperous, as 
Ireland is miserable. Dear bread and low wages are the best 
recruiting parties. Fighting, marching, and starving, are three 
kinds of amusement in which the Irish excel ! The Irish pop- 
ulation are healthy and robust, owing to agricultural pursuits, 
which are attended to in Ireland more generally than in Eng- 
land or Scotland. An English officer of the British Legion, in 
the Spanish service, remarks : " Had the whole of the Legion 
been composed of Irish, instead of losing one thousand men at 
Vittoria, we might not have lost one hundred. In spite of all 
their hardships, the severity of the weather, the total want of 
pay, the Irish lived, thrived, and grew fat." Sir E. L. Bulwer, 
in his " England and the English," says that two thirds of the 
British army are Irish. In some of the British ships during the 
wars consequent to the French Revolution, nearly the whole 
complement of men were Irish. "Transfer," said Mr. Grattan, 
in 1796, "the Irish seamen to the French, and where is the 
British navy ?" In the same year, Mr. Tone said, " Let it 
never be forgotten, that two thirds of the British seamen, as 
they are called, are in fact Irishmen." On Tone's voyage to 
America, the vessel in which he sailed was boarded by a 
British frigate, whose crew consisted of two hundred and 
twenty men, and of these all but ten were Irishmen. Dr. Mac 
Nevin states that the proportion of Irish in the British navy, 
in 1807, was about two thirds. Lord Collingwood proposed to 
the British admiralty to send yearly five thousand Irish boys, 
from twelve to sixteen years of age, to the British navy, as 
they made the best sailors. 

Some people say that there is much crime in Ireland; but the 
jails are filled with the victims, not of vice, but of misgovern- 
ment. Irish crime arises chiefly from a resistance to what the 
people consider unjust laws, which they think it is their bounden 
duty to resist. A committee of the National Repeal Associa- 



59 

tion of Ireland, have made out a report, showing the amount of 
crime committed in England and Ireland, during a short period 
of observation, immediately preceding the date of the report ; 
from which we gather the following facts : — In England the 
number of murders was twenty ; in Ireland, during the same 
period, only eight. In England the number of cases of stab- 
bing was nineteen ; in Ireland, during the same time, only 
one ; and the criminal in that case was an Englishman ! 
Cases of suicide in England, twenty-six ; in the same time, in 
Ireland, only one, though there are more of the causes which 
lead to suicide, in Ireland, than in England. The reason 
which an Irishman gives why he does not kill himself, is, that 
he would rather commit suicide on any other person, than on 
himself! In several instances, the judge, in place of having 
prisoners presented to him for trial, has had a pair of white 
gloves, which is the usual gift of the sheriffs of the county, 
when there are no criminal cases on the calendar. I do not 
claim that Irishmen are totally free from crime ; but I do say, 
that no people are more conscientious, more religious, more 
free from every vice, than the Irish are, even while laboring 
under poverty, oppression, and every other disadvantage. 

Such are the men — such is their enthusiasm for this country — 
such are their good qualities, both mental and corporeal — and 
such their courage ; yet these men, who have made England 
what she is, who won the glorious victories of the Nile and 
Trafalgai-, and who, under an Irish commander-in-chief, acted 
a noble part at Waterloo, it is said, would not be a valuable 
population ; and this enthusiasm for America, so natural in 
Irishmen, must be drowned out with a flood of vituperation. 
These are the men who must be kept in slavery and want, 
crowded together on a small Island, while prairies, untrodden 
and uncultivated, afford room enough for the surplus popula- 
tion of Europe till the end of the world, if it come as soon as 
some fanatics would make us believe. Rich lands must be 
kept in wild luxuriance, while we, scattered along the sea- 



60 

board, would guard what God has given for man, as the un- 
disputed territory of bears and buffaloes. God grant that this 
country may be protected from all danger. I cannot see that 
she has any thing to fear from immigrants, after they become 
citizens ; but I do see great danger from immigrants in this 
country who are not naturalized. A body of aliens would be 
dangerous in our midst, if among us and not of us, if foreigners 
and not citizens. " Obstructing the laws of naturalization of 
foreigners, and refusing to pass others to encourage their mi- 
gration hither," was declared tyrannical and unjust in the 
Declaration of Independence. Let those who are doing so 
now, take the language to themselves, or say that the signers 
of that instrument told an untruth. 

The Irish are not bad friends. Who will sooner share their 
bread with the needy ? Who will more readily turn to assist 
those in distress ? Let their faults be forgiven, their virtues 
cherished, their minds enlightened, and America will find in 
them, useful friends and honorable citizens. We thank America 
for what she has done for old Ireland. We thank Colonel 
Johnson, of Kentucky, for telling the truth so boldly to his 
fellow-citizens, that America owes a debt of gratitude to Irish- 
men, who were never shot in the backs on the battlefields of 
liberty. We thank Governor Seward, of New York, for des- 
pising power when bought at the expense of principle, and for 
daring to plead for justice to Irishmen, in spite of party bigotry. 
We thank the newspaper press of this country for its sympathy 
and assistance. We thank the poets of America for invoking 
the muses to shed their tears over the woes of Ireland. As 
a society, we thank Pierpont, and Street, and other Amer- 
ican poets, who have given their pens to the cause of Ireland 
and of liberty. But above all, we thank one who is present 
with us to-day, who has done so'much for our society ; who, 
on our first appearance about a year ago, went home and 
dedicated to us those beautiful lines which appeared in the 
Daily Herald, and who has spoken and written for us at 



61 

every opportunity since. Where so much is due, there can 
be no suspicion of flattery. I speak only the feeling of every 
Irishman's heart, when I say, that from the bottom of those 
hearts we thank our distinguished guest, the poet Percival. 

Though Ireland has been betrayed by both parties in Eng- 
land, who, while they promised her liberty, have been them- 
selves the servants of corruption ; yet a brighter day is dawn- 
ing. Let the tidings go forth, that Ireland is free. Let the 
language of her own orator be true, as regards herself. Let 
the soul of Ireland, rising from the sleep of a seven hundred 
years' political death, walk forth again in her native majesty. 
Let her " body swell beyond the measure of her chains that 
burst from around her." Her doom has been pronounced in 
all the transformations of the English language. Let the altar 
and the God of intolerance and tyranny sink together in the 
dust. The hands of freedom must not be shackled — the mind's 
immortal spring must not be broken. It is as elastic as the 
voice of Echo, shouting from her own deep dens and beetling 
hills. Let her stand forth now, before another century writes 
its record in the book of time, " redeemed, regenerated, disen- 
thralled, by the irresistible genius of universal freedom." 

I have thus, my friends, sketched before you the picture of a 
country, in whose welfare I am heart and soul interested. The 
subject is one in which Americans, too, must take a lively 
interest. Our Washington took the cause of liberty under his 
protection, and crowned it with success. My task has been 
to dwell upon the same cause, not triumphant, but vanquished. 
While here we can pay respect to the great father of our 
country, and pour out from full hearts, thanksgiving on the 
altar of freedom, it may not be unprofitable to look to another 
altar of the same divinity, not crowned with rejoicing, but 
stained with the blood of those who offered up their lives 
in her service. While we merge all feelings of country, in 
awarding the highest honor to Washington, still we number 
in the same army of patriots, Curran, Grattan, and Emmet, 



62 

and we claim American sympathy, when we remember that 
the very same cause which is here called patriotism, is there 
called treason. While with " bonfires and illuminations" 
we celebrate their memory here, silent tears over untimely 
and dishonored graves, are the exercises there. Here, respect 
and affection are their rewards ; there, the scaffold and the 
dungeon, and the iron entering into their very souls. Wash- 
ington would have shared the fate of Ireland's patriots, but 
that under God, his prudence perfected what his courage con- 
templated. There is a mysterious sympathy between Ireland 
and America. In 1776, America raised the cry of Indepen- 
dence, which was reechoed from Irish sympathy, in spite of 
British threats. In 1783, American Independence was ac- 
knowledged by England ; in the same year, the Independence 
of the Irish Parliament was proclaimed by England. But 
here the parallel must stop. England attempted again to sub- 
due this country, and failed because America forgot party and 
went for country. England again attempted to subjugate 
Ireland, and internal divisions and party jealousy among 
Irishmen, made her too lamentably successful. Freedom, 
contemplating her heroes in this country, shouts with cheerful 
voice as she bounds over the free hills of a happy land. " Go 
sound the loud timbrel :" in Ireland, weeping as she sits amid 
desolations, she says with sepulchral voice, 

" O, breathe not his name." 

We have not come to injure our adopted country : Americans 
by choice, and in spite of opposing difficulties, we will cling 
to freedom and her laws. We may not have the storied 
legend of our ancient pride in this new world. We may not 
claim, as in Ireland, a St. Patrick, or as in England, a saint 
George. But we have a " land of the free, and a home of the 
brave." A country to protect, and a treasure to defend ; 
aye, and a saint to be proud of, too — for if there is a saint 
George in heaven, it is George Washington. 



63 

Gentlemen of the Society : 

I have thus endeavored to bring before you something ap- 
propriate for the occasion. Such as it is, I have produced it, 
though in much haste, with great cheerfulness. Among the 
few pleasant recollections which I shall carry with me from 
New Haven, is my connection with you as a Society. It is 
now nearly five years since I first came to this beautiful City, a 
poor, friendless being — none who knew me — none within thou- 
sands of miles, to whom I could go in the hour of sorrow to 
unburden my heart. Since then, I have protected myself, 
though not always successfully, yet manfully, against " the 
slings and arrows of outrageous fortune." Nothing has cheer- 
ed me more than the presence of a few honest hearted Irish- 
men, whom I have met in my daily walks, and in the meetings 
of your Society. I should like to live among you ; but I find 
that my stay here will not be long. I have assisted in forming 
this Society, and have watched over it with care to the pre- 
sent time ; but I may probably never meet you in public 
again. I shall soon leave this City, where I have spent so 
many hours of pleasure, not unmingled with pain. I know 
not where fortune may place me. " The world is all before 
me, where to choose." I trust that Providence will be my 
guide. Wherever I may go, I shall rejoice to hear of your 
prosperity. Your Society has done great good to the Irish in 
New Haven. Continue to cherish it. Never let any thing 
like party strife enter your meetings. Never suspect each 
others' actions, but be frank and generous. You owe much 
to the kind feeling of the citizens of New Haven ; you are 
much indebted to the press, and to our most learned men, for 
the beautiful and complimentary pieces they have written for 
you. I need not exhort you to be grateful in return for these 
acts of kindness. Your hearts will set that matter right. 
Wherever I may be, I shall rejoice to hear that the Irishmen 
of New Haven still stand high in the affections of their fellow- 
citizens ; and when I shall leave you, to see you perhaps no 



64 

more, while I bid you farewell, 1 shall pray for a blessing 
upon you, and upon the dear land of our birth. Soon may her 
harp breathe forth the notes of harmony once more. May her 
scenery soon be vocal again with the echoes of friendship and 
love. May a noontide of glory banish forever the memory of 
former darkness ; soon may her winter be ended ; and the 
hopes that were nourished through it by her friends, bear rich 
fruits in her harvest of joy. 



NOTES. 

Page 10. — In referring to Tacitus, I do not mean the late editions of that author. 
In modern times, attempts have been incessantly made to take every thing- away 
from Ireland, but misgovernment, which descends to her like an heir-loom. The 
old editions of Tacitus, say " Melius aditus portusque, per commerciaet negotiatores 
cogniti." A new and barbarous reading transfers the word Melius to the preceding 
sentence, and thereby spoils the latinity of the historian, and shows the pains that 
have been taken to do injustice to Ireland. 

Page 11. — The claim to great antiquity runs through all the history, legend, and 
poetry of Ireland. Keating tells us that Seth, the son of Adam, visited Ireland with 
" three fair daughters of the cursed Cain." Banba was the name of Cain's eldest 
daughter, and hence the oldest poets call Ireland the isle of Banba. Noah's niece 
Cassera arrived in Ireland the Wednesday morning before the flood ! Some Irishmen 
say that the heroes of Homer, &c. were stolen from Irish history. Diomede, son of 
Tydeus, is only the modern name for Dermod Mac Teddy — (Mac means son.) 
Achilles, son of Peleus, is only another way of spelling Achill Mac Phaill ; and so 
with all the other great men of antiquity. Troy, likewise, is only a corruption of 
ancient Tara ! 

Page 43. — In the case of Talbot vs. Janson, (3 Dallas' Reports, 133,) the subject 
of expatriation is discussed. Several petitions have been presented to Congress 
during the present session, by Mr. Clay and others. As they were referred to the 
appropriate committees, I expect to see a report on the subject, before Congress 
adjourns. Every Irishman should petition, till Congress shall have met the question 
and settled it forever, as far as America is concerned. 



TO THE IRISH IN AMERICA, 



W. E. Robinson proposes to republish, during the present summer, 
THE GREEN BOOK, by J. C. O'Callaghan, which has been so 
warmly commended by O'Connell and other distinguished Irishmen. 
The work was published a short time since in Dublin, at ten shillings 
sterling; only a few copies have reached the United States, and the 
price of these has been from three to four dollars each. Mr. R. 
proposes to republish the work in the same style with the Dublin 
edition, making a volume of about five hundred pages, of the most 
important information to every Irishman, for one dollar and twenty- 
five cents per copy. Where a quantity is taken by a society or 
agent, they will be sold for one dollar each. 

At the request of several friends of Ireland, in different parts of 
the country, Mr. Robinson will prefix an Introductory Essay, con- 
taining his Lecture on "The Union of England with Ireland," 
which he delivered in many of our large cities during the past win- 
ter ; showing the miseries resulting from nearly seven centuries of 
misgov eminent, corruption, and oppression ; with many curious facts 
in the history of Ireland's subjugation, collected from various recent 
and scarce publications. 

Orders from societies or agents, addressed to " W. E. Robinson,- 
New Haven, Conn.," (post paid,) will be promptly attended to. 

The book will not be published till orders for the entire edition 
are received. There will, therefore, be no extra copies for sale, but 
such as are ordered before publishing. 

)Jj = ' Editors friendly to the cause of Ireland, who receive a copy 
of this Oration, will please notice this Prospectus. 



0CJ=* Page r '<~ of Ibe Oration, line 15, all er tlie word one, insert "majority.'''' 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 




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